AKIPRESS.COM - In the first quarter of this year, 1.51 million foreign citizens entered Uzbekistan for tourism purposes, the national statistics agency reported.

Compared to the same period in 2023, the number of arrivals increased by 2.1%.

Uzbekistan was most often visited by citizens of neighboring Tajikistan – 536,500 visits in three months. Kyrgyzstan came second (442,000), beating Kazakhstan (262,600). Russia remains in fourth place in terms of the number of visitors (134,200).

Turkmenistan (31,000 people) is among top-5 countries since the beginning of the year, while Turkey retreated to sixth place (21,500). India (11,600) and China (10,000) are ahead of South Korea (7,600), and Germany closes the top ten, as in the year before, with 3,800.

According to Deputy Minister of Economic Development of the Russian Federation Dmitry Volvach at the Tashkent International Investment Forum, 403 thousand Russians visited Uzbekistan in 2023. Compared to pre-pandemic 2019, their number increased almost 11 times, Kun.uz reported.