Cultural Heritage, Tourism, and Handicrafts Minister Ali-Asghar Mounesan said that over 3,000 historical objects were returned to the country during the 12th administration, and this trend will continue.
He made the statement at the opening ceremony of the Persian Gulf Museum on Monday in the southwestern province of Bushehr.
In only one of these cases, in October 2019, 1,780 ancient tablets, dating back to the Achaemenid Empire, were repatriated from the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, the minister said.
He continued that the US bore the responsibility for packing, insurance, and transportation of these objects.
He also added that a total of eight tourism-related projects, worth $71.4 million, are scheduled to come on stream in Iran’s southwestern province of Bushehr.
The ministry has played an important role in the country’s currency so that in 2019, which was the peak of the country’s tourism industry, the ministry’s share of the country’s GDP reached $11.8 billion, which is a very significant figure, he said.
He noted that in the first 10 months of the last Iranian year (ending March 19, 2020), before the coronavirus outbreak, Iran hosted 8,860,000 foreign tourists.
Source: Iran Daily