Could cemeteries resurrect Egypt's tourism industry?
Egypt's Ministry of Tourism is being urged to promote interest in the country's 16 cemeteries for commonwealth military victims of the world wars.
Egypt has undertaken the task of reviving its ailing travel industry, and it might have found a viable, if surprising, solution: cemetery tourism.
The Egyptian Council on International Human Rights and Development is asking the Ministry of Tourism to tout the potential of the three Suez Canal governorates — Port Said, Suez and Ismailia — by using Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) cemeteries in promotional campaigns, saying they constitute a tourist attraction for European countries.
CWGC general coordinator Tamer Al-Jundi said in a March 31 press statement that the graves are more important to the British than the pharaohs' tombs, given that their ancestors are buried there, and promoting the sites would generate more income than that from the Suez Canal. He wants the government to organize a special festival to welcome thousands of British and other tourists coming to visit these graves.
Tharwat Ajami, general counsel of the Chamber of Tourism in Luxor, said in an April 4 news release that promoting tourism to CWGC cemeteries, especially in Ismailia, which has the largest share of graves, must be taken seriously for these sites to serve as world attractions among Egypt's other tourism destinations.
