Croatia has reported an increase of 5 per cent in the number of tourists who visited the country in 2003 but tourism industries in Hungary, the Czech Republic, Romania and Serbia Montenegro have all recorded “negative results” for the same period.

During the first seven months of this year, Croatia welcomed 4.8 million tourists, an increase of 5.2 per cent in comparison with the same period last year. The majority of visitors who took a holiday on the Croatian coasts were Germans, Slovenians, Italians, Austrians and Czech. Tourism turnover rose during the six first months to 1.5bn euros, an increase of 76 per cent in comparison to the same period last year.

Bulgaria also fared well with a record increase of 14 per cent in the number of visitors compared to last year. However only 833,700 foreign tourists spent at least a night in a Czech hotel during the first quarter of 2003, a decrease of 8.6 per cent compared with 2002.

Romanian tourism was down this year by 10 per cent. Romanian minister Miron Mitrea was said to be disappointed and intends to re-promote destinations in order to double the takings next year.