Iran to restart tourist visa service

Iran will restart allotting visas to foreign tourists from next month, officials said, after appending services for 19 months due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Tourism Minister Ezzatollah Zarghami said, “The issuance of tourist visas from land and air borders will resume from October 23”.

Iran proscribed the entry of foreign nationals in March last year, a few weeks after the Islamic republic noticed its first cases of Covid-19 infection, except for medical and business reasons.

The conclusion to resume visa services was taken at a meeting of Iran’s anti-coronavirus team that was joined by President Ebrahim Raisi, local media reported.

“This regulation will not include direct and indirect travel from or to high-risk countries declared by the World Health Organization,” quoted the committee.

Whereas, Iran is fighting the Middle East’s lethal outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic.

According to the latest official figures, the country has reported closely 120,000 deaths from more than 5.5 million cases of infection.

The tourism ministry stated in February that more than 8.8 million tourists visited Iran in the year before the eruption of the coronavirus, saying tourism was down by 94 percent.