ANKARA

The gap created by Russian tourists in Turkey can be filled by European tourists through visa liberalization with EU states, Turkish Movement for Visa-Free Europe Chairman Mehmet Okumus said Tuesday.

Okumus said that European tourists could in fact help Turkey increase its tourism revenue by $15 billion to $20 billion per year.

"By the right marketing tools, we can see a significant increase in tourist numbers in Turkey from EU countries. The gap created by Russian tourists will be filled by European tourists," he said.

Turkey’s resort city of Antalya and its town Alanya are known to be hotspots for Russian tourists. However, after a Russian warplane was downed by Turkey after it violated Turkish airspace on Nov. 24, Russia’s tourism agency, Rostourism, said on Nov. 26 that cooperation between Russia and Turkey in the sector would “obviously” be halted.

According to Turkish Tourism Ministry statistics, 3.54 million Russian tourists visited Turkey in 2015 from January to October, down from 4.1 million in 2013 and 4.3 million in 2014, mainly due to Russia’s economic problems amid Western economic sanctions imposed on the country.

Turkey hosts some nearly 40 million tourists who spend $35 billion every year. In the first 10 months of the year, the largest number of foreigners who visited Turkey were from Germany with a 15.56 percent share, followed by Russia with 10.70 percent and Britain with 7.33 percent.

On Sunday, EU leaders and Turkey signed a deal for visa restrictions to be lifted by October 2016. Okumus welcomed the move.

"Turkish people have been suffering a great amount by illegal and unacceptable EU visa requirements economically and socially for about 35 years," Okumus said.

On average, a million people a year from Turkey have applied for visas to EU countries. "It costs about €300 million, including visa applications fees and other charges such as insurance," he said.

According to Okumus, Turkish citizens were not willing to travel to the EU to find work or to settle abroad anymore.

"But they are traveling and willing to travel to the EU to sell goods, to invest, to create new jobs, to find new markets, to buy and sell, to study and to take holidays...," he said.