Travel/Tourism
Ukraine Crisis Hits Russia’s Tourism Industry
By Kester Kenn Klomegah
Russia’s tourism industry, both in-bound and out-bound, is severely hit by the war-ravaged crisis that unfolded in the former Soviet republic of Ukraine in late February. For more than two years, the tourism industry was affected due to the widespread Covid-19 that shattered the world.
Industry operators say that the impact on tourism due to Russia’s “special military operation” in Ukraine has pushed the United States and Canada, European Union, Australia, New Zealand and many other countries to impose a series of sanctions, which are currently affecting the smooth operation of tourism business.
According to statistics, over these past three years, including the Covid-19 restrictions and the Russia-Ukraine crisis, foreign airlines have carried an estimated 128.1 million passengers, but most passengers were stuck due to border closures and repatriated in 2020. As Covid-19 subsided, and the latest volley of sanctions have cut foreign travel, especially to the United States and Europe for Russians.
Analysts expect the tourism business to develop considerably inside Russia. Russian tourists might instead opt for South America and Caribbean, Asian and African destinations such as Cyprus, Thailand, Turkey, Malta, Maldives, Zanzibar, and Egypt. Russian citizens might not fear a sharp rise in airplane ticket prices, as during the spring and upcoming summer seasons costs are being determined, among other factors, by demand and purchasing power.
Many Russian tourists are stranded due to economic sanctions, handicapped by bank withdrawals using the international credit card system. Zarina Doguzova at the Russian Federal Agency for Tourism told the local Russian media that nearly 90,000 tourists were repatriated in March.
According to the agency, Egypt has the largest number of packaged tourists from Russia. The repatriation process has been hampered and takes more time due to new Western sanctions targeting the planes expected to be used for special flights from Egypt to Russia. The tour operators struggled to bring back Russian packaged tourists by using different ways, including connecting flights of foreign airlines through third countries from the United Arab Emirates, Turkey, the Maldives and Thailand.
On April 4, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin announced that from April 9, Russia would cancel restrictions on flights to 52 countries imposed due to the pandemic, including Argentina, India, China, South Africa, and other friendly countries. It applies to regular and charter flights between Russia and several other foreign countries.
It will take into account the epidemiological situation in individual countries: a previous decision was made to completely lift restrictions on regular and charter flights with Algeria, Argentina, Afghanistan, Bahrain, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Botswana, Brazil, Venezuela, Vietnam, Hong Kong, Egypt and Zimbabwe.
The rest include Israel, India, Indonesia, Jordan, Iraq, Kenya, China, North Korea, Costa Rica, Kuwait, Lebanon, Lesotho, Mauritius, Madagascar, Malaysia, Maldives, Morocco, Mozambique, Moldova, Mongolia, Myanmar, Namibia, Oman, Pakistan, Peru, Saudi Arabia, Seychelles, Serbia, Syria, Thailand, Tanzania, Tunisia, Turkey, Uruguay, Fiji, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Ethiopia, South Africa, and Jamaica.
The protracted Ukraine war threatens several tourist destinations that rely on Russian visitors. Turkey, Uzbekistan, the UAE, Tajikistan, Armenia, Greece, Egypt, Kazakhstan, and Cyprus are among the top 25 countries for outbound Russian tourism by flight capacity, according to Mabrian Technologies, an intelligence platform for the tourism industry.
For instance, Egypt’s economy relies heavily on tourism from Russia and Ukraine, with the two countries accounting for roughly one-third of all visitors each year. Egypt is working to open tourism markets, particularly for Germany, England, the Czech Republic, Italy, and Switzerland, following the lifting of travel restrictions to Egypt.
Thousands of Russian tourists visit Thailand’s beach resorts. The Russia-Ukraine crisis with Europe might further push Russian tourists toward popular destinations in Asia and a few destinations in Africa. While Covid-19 restrictions have been lifted, not all these countries are considered popular destinations for Russian tourists. Russia is looking to develop and promote domestic tourism.
According to statistics, Russian tourists spent over $300 billion abroad over the past 20 years, and their money could build domestic tourism infrastructure. Experts also argue that the Russian tourism infrastructure has been demonstrating some growth over the past year, and it is important not to lose this pace under the current circumstances in the world.
Federal Agency for Tourism, which promotes tours both domestic and foreign, underscored steps being taken by the Russian government to put tourism on track including subsidy offers for local destinations, an effort towards encouraging and promoting domestic tourism, which are safe and have comfortable conditions for Russian tourists, during the forthcoming seasons.
Russian government’s latest package of measures to support the economy in the face of sanctions will address the tourism industry and a number of other sectors, and it provides for tax incentives, Federation Council Deputy Speaker Nikolai Zhuravlev said this month.
According to the Association of Tour Operators of Russia (ATOR), external tourism will steadily pick up despite the current international situation and the rising dollar and euro exchange rates, and the decline in the share of foreign tours in the volume of sales during February and March, during the months of the Russia-Ukraine crisis.
Russia’s membership has been stripped off from international organizations, the latest was the United Nations Human Rights Council. On March 8, the Executive Council proposed holding an extraordinary assembly to consider a possible suspension of Russia’s membership in the United Nations World Tourism Organization.
The latest analysis from Astons reveals that online search interest in Donald Trump’s US Gold Card has rapidly dwindled in the days following the President’s announcement, while interest in European Golden Visa programmes has remained steadfast.
The US President has announced plans to introduce a “Gold Card” visa scheme through which he hopes wealthy foreigners will invest at least $5m in the US economy in exchange for what Trump calls “Green Card privileges“.
Astons has analysed global Google search trend data* for terms related to Golden Visas in the days and weeks following Trump’s announcement and found that while there was an initial flurry in search interest, this quickly dwindled. And even at its peak, it never surpassed the interest garnered by the Golden Visa programmes offered by Spain and Greece.
In the 10 days immediately following Trump’s Gold Card announcement, the online search interest score for the term ‘US golden visa’ averaged out at 27.90. Meanwhile, the term ‘US gold card’ scored 24.10, while ‘Trump golden visa’ scored 22.20.
During the same time frame, search interest in European Golden Visas was significantly stronger. ‘Spain golden visa’ scored 38.90, while interest in ‘Greece golden visa’ was scored at 36.50.
However, after this initial 10 days following the announcement, interest in Trump’s offering rapidly decline, as during the subsequent 10-day period, search interest in ‘US gold card’ fell by -82.6%, interest in ‘Trump golden visa’ fell by -76.1%, and interest in ‘US golden visa’ fell by -55.6%.
At the same time, interest in European golden visa programmes remained steadfast.
In fact, interest in ‘Greece golden visa’ increased by +1.1%, while interest in ‘Spain golden visa’ remained unchanged at 38.90.
Astons Business Development Director and Head of Astons Cyprus Office, Denis Kravchenko, commented:
“Donald Trump’s plan to introduce what is essentially a residency by investment program that, apparently, provides a quick path for citizenship to the US has understandably generated a surge in interest and speculation. But the $5m price tag is likely going to be far too high to result in a large enough level of uptake for it to reduce the US’s national debt as it is intended to do.
It is also possible that this new programme could become more popular than America’s existing EB-5 visa programme which already offers green cards to those who are willing to invest between $800,000–$1m into the US economy, so doubts around investors now being willing to pay a substantially higher price for residency are well-founded.
Should Trump decide to scrap the EB-5, one of the world’s oldest residency by investment programmes having been introduced by President George H. W. Bush under the Immigration Act of 1990, it will be all the more surprising given that 2024 saw 5,000 applications for the programme, marking an annual uplift of 85%.
It remains unclear whether Trump’s program will offer any substantial advantages—such as expedited processing – currently, the EB-5 path to a green card takes between one and ten years depending on nationality with the absence of stringent background checks—to motivate investors to commit more funds.
Trump may face further challenges due to there being other countries in the world that offer far more accessible programmes. Investors can, for example, qualify for Maltese citizenship through exceptional naturalisation for an investment of around 1 million euros, for which an investor can obtain citizenship to an EU member state in an average of 1.5 years without the need for permanent relocation.
Then there are the multitude of European Golden Visa programmes that are also far more budget-friendly than Trump’s new initiative. Hungary launched a new residency program in summer 2024, requiring a minimum investment of at least 250,000 euros, and Portugal’s offer starts at a minimum investment of 500,000 euros.
However, it’s Greece’s Golden Visa opportunities that are proving most popular of all,
Despite the entry investment threshold recently being raised, it is still possible to obtain residency by purchasing property for just 250,000 euros. Somewhat ironically, it’s young Americans who are driving the recent surge in demand for Greek Golden Visas which, in 2024, set a record, issuing 17,194 visas (based on 11 months of data).”
By Aduragbemi Omiyale
Airbus has provided an update on its roadmap to pioneer the future of commercial aviation in the decades to come, outlining plans to prepare a next-generation single-aisle aircraft that could enter service in the second half of the 2030s, as well as its revised ZEROe project roadmap to mature the technologies associated with hydrogen-powered flight.
This was at the 2025 Airbus Summit, where the firm reconfirmed its commitment to bringing to market a commercially viable hydrogen aircraft and presented some of the key technology building blocks that will enable the advent of a fully electric, fuel-cell powered commercial aircraft – a pathway which stands out as the most promising, following years of research into hydrogen aviation.
These technologies were notably showcased as part of a new, notional concept of a hydrogen aircraft powered by four, 2-megawatt electric propulsion engines, each driven by a fuel cell system that converts hydrogen and oxygen into electrical energy.
The four fuel cell systems would be supplied via two liquid hydrogen tanks. This concept will continue to be refined over the coming years as additional tests will help mature the technologies associated with hydrogen storage and distribution, as well as with the propulsion systems.
In 2023, Airbus successfully demonstrated a 1.2MW hydrogen-propulsion system, and in 2024, end-to-end testing of an integrated fuel cell stack, electric motors, gearboxes, inverters and heat exchangers was completed.
To address liquid hydrogen handling and distribution challenges in flight, Airbus, in collaboration with Air Liquide Advanced Technologies, has developed the Liquid Hydrogen BreadBoard (LH2BB) in Grenoble, France.
Integrated ground testing is planned for 2027 at the Electric Aircraft System Test House in Munich, combining the propulsive bench and hydrogen distribution system for comprehensive system validation.
“Hydrogen is at the heart of our commitment to decarbonise aviation. While we’ve adjusted our roadmap, our dedication to hydrogen-powered flight is unwavering.
“Just as we saw in the automotive sector, fully electric aircraft powered by hydrogen fuel cells have the potential in the longer term to revolutionise air transport for the better, complementing the sustainable aviation fuel pathway,” the Head of Future Programmes at Airbus, Bruno Fichefeux, stated.
“Over the last five years, we have explored multiple hydrogen-propulsion concepts, before down-selecting this fully electric concept. We are confident it could provide the necessary power density for a hydrogen-powered commercial aircraft and could evolve as we mature the technology.
“In the coming years, we will concentrate on advancing the storage, distribution and propulsion systems, while also advocating for the regulatory framework needed to ensure these aircraft can take flight,” the Head of the ZEROe Project at Airbus, Glenn Llewellyn, added.
By Adedapo Adesanya
Nigeria was exempted from a provisional list of 43 countries that the United States, under the administration of President Donald Trump, is mulling a new travel ban for their citizens.
Business Post reports that out of the 43 countries, 22 of them are in Africa but Nigeria is so far exempted.
According to reports, the draft list featured 43 countries, divided into three categories of travel restrictions – red, orange, and yellow.
The red category of countries whose citizens would be completely barred from entering the United States includes Afghanistan, Bhutan, Cuba, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Venezuela and Yemen.
Another 10 countries in the orange category — Belarus, Eritrea, Haiti, Laos, Myanmar, Pakistan, Russia, Sierra Leone, South Sudan and Turkmenistan — would see their visas sharply restricted.
The New York Times reported that in these cases, affluent business travelers might be allowed to enter, but not people traveling on immigrant or tourist visas.
Citizens from countries on the orange list would also have to undergo in-person interviews to receive a visa.
Another 22 countries on a yellow list would have 60 days to address US concerns or risk being moved up to one of the more stringent categories.
“The officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive internal deliberations, cautioned that the list had been developed by the State Department several weeks ago, and that changes were likely by the time it reached the White House,” the New York Times said.
This is reminiscent of moves carried out by President Trump in his first stint as president, when he banned some Muslim majority counties like Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen — which ignited international outrage and led to domestic court rulings against it.
Iraq and Sudan were dropped from the list, but in 2018 the Supreme Court upheld a later version of the ban for the other nations — as well as North Korea and Venezuela.
Already, the US President has frozen the US refugee admission programme and almost all foreign aid.
Provisional Ban List
Red list
Countries whose citizens would be completely barred from entering the United States include:
1. Afghanistan
2. Bhutan.
3. Cuba.
4. Iran
5. Libya
6. North Korea
7. Somalia
8. Sudan
9. Syria
10. Venezuela
11. Yemen
Orange list
Citizens from countries on the orange list would also have to undergo in-person interviews to receive a visa. These countries include:
12. Belarus
13. Eritrea
14. Haiti
15. Laos
16. Myanmar
17. Pakistan
18. Russia
19. Sierra Leone
20. South Sudan
21. Turkmenistan
Yellow List
They would have 60 days to address US concerns or risk being moved up to one of the more stringent categories. The following countries fall into that category:
22. Angola
23. Antigua and Barbuda
24. Benin
25. Burkina Faso
26. Cambodia
27. Cameroon
28. Cape Verde
29. Chad
30. Republic of Congo
31. Democratic Republic of Congo
32. Dominica
33. Equatorial Guinea
34. Gambia
35. Liberia
36. Malawi
37. Mali
38. Mauritania
39. St. Kitts and Nevis
40. St. Lucia
41. São Tomé and Príncipe
42. Vanuatu
43. Zimbabwe.
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