According to CYSTAT data released on Friday, tourist arrivals continued their upward trend in June 2005, surging 6.7% to 282.652 against 264,799 last year.

This increase is mostly attributable to the increase in the British and German tourist arrivals by 5.3% and 16.9% to 167.722 and 12,273 against 159.329 and 10.502 in 2004 respectively. On the other hand, Greek tourist arrivals slipped 0.5% to 12.788 against 12.850 in the corresponding month of 2004.

For January-June, 2005, tourist arrivals recorded an increase of 5.93% to 1.018.914 against 961.850 in the corresponding period of 2004.

Tourist arrivals from the UK, Germany and France for the same period showed an increase of 3.9%, 27.5% and 14.9% to 563.388, 91.556 and 25.114 against 542.203, 71.811 and 21.849 respectively in the corresponding period of 2004. Tourist arrivals from Sweden increased by 4.1% to 34.472 against 33.130, arrivals from Greece surged 3.7% to 61.298 against 59.130 and arrivals from Russia put on 0.8% to 34.946 against 34.675 in the first half of 2004.

The United Kingdom holds the largest market share (55.3%), followed by Germany with 8.9% and Greece with 6%.