One of the reasons for this closure is the uncertainty over returning time of the Iranian tourism industry to the international markets.
"Iran was a big market for Thai tourism, as Iran accounted for 16% of the total Middle East tourism to Thailand." Prior to the coronavirus pandemic, the sanctions and other issues caused serious problems in the field of transferring money between two countries. Even the Dubai office was closed due to the sanctions. We could not transfer any money from Thailand to Iran. because of these problems the money was just transferred by individuals between two countries. Now, even these trips are not made anymore”, Homer Baraghani, the representative of the Thai Ministry of Tourism in Iran, said in an interview.
"With the closure of this office, tourism activities between two countries will be followed up in Dubai office like before 2009 and Thailand will no longer have a tourism office in Iran." However, whenever there were problems such as visas for travel agencies, the office used to tackle them.
"This office was established in 2009 and started its official activity in 2010. Due to the activities of the office, Thailand had about 134000 Iranian tourists in 2017, ranking first in the Middle East, but before Coronavirus pandemic, this number reached 69000 tourists”, He added.
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