Egypt stands to lose $273 million a month from flight suspensions

An ally of Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, the king “directed Saudi Arabian Airlines to continue running flights to Sharm el-Sheikh from Riyadh and Jeddah in support of tourism in the Arab Republic of Egypt”, the Saudi Press Agency reported on Thursday.

In unusually candid comments, the Foreign Secretary said Egypt was one of several countries that have failed to properly train and motivate its staff to ensure the security of its airports.

Egyptian officials say European, Russian and Middle Eastern teams are inspecting security measures at Cairo’s worldwide airport relating to passenger and cargo aircraft travelling to their countries. Sharm al-Sheikh accounts for about 70 per cent of visits by Britons, a major tourism market for Egypt.

Dutch tour operator Corendon has said it stopped offering holidays in Sharm el-Sheikh in Egypt in early 2014 after a warning about security threats.

About 10 per cent of bookings were cancelled on the day of the crash, Gafy said, and the number jumped to around 40 per cent after Britain and Russian Federation suspended flights into Sharm al-Sheikh.

The deputy head of Russia’s Union of the Tourism Industry, Yuri Barzykin, told Tass on Wednesday that Russian holidaymakers “should not dismiss the idea to relax at home” and should opt to holiday in Russia if they are finding alternatives to Egypt overseas too expensive.

Other Russians remain in Egypt as part of the investigation committee seeking to determine the cause of the crash.

“The indications and analysis so far of the sound on the black box indicate it was a bomb”, said the Egyptian investigation team member.

He believes that the occupancy rates in hotels will decline by 90 per cent after the departure of 79,000 Russians and 20,000 Brits, as well as Belgian and German tourists.

El-Sisi’s visit comes ten days after the crash of Russian airbus A321, which killed all 224 people on board while on route from Sinai to Russia’s St. Petersburg.

The United States and Britain said they had intelligence assessments that the plane was bombed by Islamist insurgents.

“We are losing a big amount by losing the British and the Russians”, he said.

El-Sissi said authorities have carried out regular checks on all airports over the past few months, and that other countries had been involved in the inspections. The crash has led to calls for greater security at airports in regions near where jihadists operate.