Mr Abdulla bin Suwaidan, DTCM Deputy Director Missions, gave the presentation on the sidelines of the three-day gathering that attracted 220 top travel professionals from the network of Natalie Tours. Also present on the occasion were DTCM Executive Director Media Relations Division, Mr Eyad Ali Abdul Rahman, Mr. Ghassan Al Aridi, CEO of Alpha Tours and Ms. Natalia Vorobieva, Director General of Natalie Tours.

The presentation highlighted the various upcoming projects of Dubai including the world’s talent building, the Burj Dubai, Atlantis, The Palm hotel, Dubailand, Universal City , Dubai World Central International Airport and many more new projects. Mr. bin Suwaidan said the emirate has been attracting greater attention in the Russian and CIS markets as a destination of choice for business and leisure.

The DTCM, which operates a representation office in Moscow for the Russian, CIS and Baltic regions, has been actively participating in different Russian tourism exhibitions, including the just-concluded Leisure-2007 for the past 10 years. It also conducts regular sponsored familiarisation trips for the Russian media representatives and tour operators. 

The support for the Natalie Tours Congress, he said, was part of the promotional and marketing initiatives of the Department with the aim of attracting more visitors to Dubai as its tourism product gets expanded.

Over 422,000 Russians stayed with the Dubai hotel establishments in the year 2006 while a 15 per cent increase in the number of Russians using the Dubai International Airport was recorded. For the 2006/2007 season, as many as 983 tour operators are featuring Dubai in their programmes, 18 per cent more than the previous season.