Britons joining first tour group to Iraq

Four Britons will join other westerners in the first organized tour of Iraq’s Arab areas in six years.

Travel Insurance News - 16/02/2009

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During their two-week tour in March, the travellers will be accompanied at by armed guards at all times, and they will not be permitted to wander off on their own or leave their hotels at night time. The minibus tour will take in about a dozen important sites in the country, including Basra, Baghdad and Babylon.

UK-based Hinterland Travel, which is organised the tour, had previously offered trips to Iraq, during the rule of Saddam Hussein and then later in October of 2003 until violence may offering the tours impossible.

Geoff Hann, who is the travel operator’s managing director, feels that the right is right to return to Iraq.

"We're seeing the beginnings of a new Iraq," Hann said. "They want normality, and tourism is part of that. If we make this trip and show that it is possible to do it successfully, that will contribute to normality."

This tentative return of western visitors to what is considered by many to be one of the world’s most dangerous destinations is being seen by Iraqi officials as a vote of confidence in the security improvements made in the country during the past year.

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