Spanish airline “Iberojet” has inaugurated a direct flight from Madrid to the eastern province of Santiago de Cuba as part of the winter tourism season.
“It is a dream come true to reach the eastern region of the country,” said the deputy director of “Iberojet”, Paul Verhagen, according to the Cuban state news agency.
Verhagen confirmed the weekly frequency of flights with more than 300 passengers through the Antonio Maceo International Airport in Santiago de Cuba.
“Iberojet” flies on Sundays from Madrid through José Martí International Airport in Havana and now also on Fridays through Santiago de Cuba Airport.
The dictatorship celebrates with great pomp the growth of tourism by more than 552 percent in 2022 compared to the previous year, with the arrival of 1,553,461 travelers from January to September, including the Cuban community abroad.
The numbers do not bode well for the fulfillment of the Díaz-Canel regime’s goal of receiving 2.5 million tourists by the end of the year.
Tourism is the second-largest item in Cuba’s gross domestic product and the second-largest source of foreign currency after exports of services, especially health care.
A few months before the end of 2022, the Ministry of Tourism was forced to concede in October that it would not reach that goal and lowered the forecast to 1.7 million international travelers, a far cry from the 4.2 million in 2019.
The Cuban regime hopes that increasing the number of flights by the end of the year will help rebound its battered tourism results.
In recent weeks, Varadero airport has been one of the busiest on the island with the resumption of operations by Polish airline “Lot” and on Wednesday, “TAAG Angola” joined the list, providing a connection to Luanda with two flights a week.
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