German travelers return to Turkey after attacks and coup attempt

Summer bookings to Turkey by German holidaymakers have doubled, though are still far from the levels seen a few years ago, German market researcher GfK said on Wednesday.

Tourists, a major source of financing for Turkey's wide current account deficit, are starting to return to the country after attacks blamed on Islamic State and Kurdish militants and an attempted coup scared them away for a couple of years.

Bookings for Turkey from Germany for summer 2018 were up 101 percent at the end of January from a year ago, GfK data showed. But the volume of bookings was still only about half of that for Greece, reversing the pattern seen a few years ago.

"But if we assume that nothing further happens to keep people away, then Turkey should return to former strength in a year or two," Doerte Nordbeck, head of Travel & Logistics Germany at GfK, told journalists...