The Turkish Foreign Ministry announced the promises of the opposition that scared away Russian tourists

In May, the number of Russian tourists visiting Turkey dropped sharply, Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said.He linked this to the promises of opposition presidential candidate Kılıçdaroğlu to join the sanctions against Moscow.

Turkey's united opposition presidential candidate Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu said that if he wins, Ankara will join the sanctions against Moscow, the number of tourists coming to the country has dropped sharply, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said in an interview with NTV.

Cavusoglu said that "Russian tourists were afraid of this statement and stopped coming." TASS, citing the words of the minister, clarifies that in May the country missed about 1 million people. According to the country's Ministry of Tourism, cited by the agency, more than 11 million tourists came to Turkey from January to April, including 1.1 million Russians.

On May 21, the head of the Foreign Ministry told the Yeni Şafak newspaper that the number of Russian tourists who came to the country this month had dropped to 10%. “His [Kılıçdaroğlu] statement scared the Russian market very much. Agencies, travel agencies and hotel owners say that the number of tourists we needed did not arrive in May, ”he claimed ( quoted by Haberler).

On May 9, the Wall Street Journal published an interview with Kılıçdaroğlu. The piece said the opposition candidate would support Turkish investment in Russia if he won, but would abide by Western decisions on sanctions against the country "to leave Moscow even more isolated." Later, the candidate's foreign policy adviser, Unal Ceviköz, told RIA Novosti that this was not a quote from Kılıçdaroglu, "but a comment by the author of the article himself."

A few days later, the Turkish Foreign Ministry reported that they began to receive appeals from Russians who fear possible difficulties with returning to their homeland if Ankara joins the sanctions.

Kılıçdaroğlu previously accused incumbent President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of being pro-Russian and stated that he was "leaning and scratching" at Moscow's door. In addition, he published a post in Russian on Twitter, in which he accused Russia of spreading fake data and a conspiracy, and also called for "take your hands off the Turkish state." In response, the press secretary of the Russian president, Dmitry Peskov , said that Moscow does not interfere in the internal affairs and electoral processes of foreign states, which has been said more than once.

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On May 28, the second round of presidential elections will be held in Turkey. According to the results of the first, which took place on May 14, Erdogan won 49.51% of the vote, and Kılıçdaroglu - 44.88%.