Antalya

The number of tourists visiting the Mediterranean resort of Antalya saw a sharp rise in April with a 40 percent increase since the same month in 2016. 

The arrivals from Russia soared 15.5 times during the period, data from the Antalya Governor's Office showed, Doğan News Agency reported on May 2. 

The Antalya Police Department has sparked debate after issuing a statement on April 27 on a ban on alcohol consumption in outdoor locations on possibilities that drinking could cause "disturbance" to the surrounding. 

Turkey's first touristic submarine, Nemo Primero, made its maiden dive into the depths of the Mediterranean just off the coast of Antalya on April 11 in a bid to provide further boost to tourism. 

The submarine's first stop was the wreck of St. Didier, a French ship which sunk during the WW II in 1942 just one kilometer off from Antalya's harbor.

Many Russian women who are married to Turkish men have returned to Turkey as the diplomatic normalization between Ankara and Moscow continues.

A number of Russians in Turkey left the country after a Russian Su-24 jet was shot down by Turkish F-16s in the Turkey-Syria border area on Nov. 24, 2015.

The oldest olive oil press in Anatolia has been discovered in the ancient city of Lyrboton Kome in Antalya, but archaeologists have expressed special excitement at revelations that many of the olive oil facilities and the town itself was founded by a woman.

In what is seen in Athens as an effort by Ankara to push through its message that Greece has limited sovereignty in the area of the Eastern Mediterranean surrounding the island of Kastelorizo, Turkish forces have in recent days maintained a steady presence in the region, either through military exercises or with the dispatch of research vessels.

A court in the southern province of Antalya has ruled that compulsory religion classes are "openly against the law," following a complaint filed by an atheist family. 

An atheist family applied to court in order to exempt their child, identified only by the initials as E.D., from compulsory religion classes, Doğan News Agency reported on March 15.

Representatives from Turkey's struggling tourism sector have called for German travelers to visit Turkey at a key annual sector event in Berlin, delivering a message saying: "We have no business with politics. We welcome you all!"

The Mediterranean resort province of Antalya is set to host over 4 million tourists from Russia and Ukraine and experience an increase in the number of arrivals from Israel after a daunting year, according to a top local association. 

The number of employed women in Turkey decreased 40,000 in November 2016 compared to the same month of 2015, according to a new report prepared by the Economic Policy Research Foundation of Turkey (TEPAV). 

TEPAV's latest workforce report stated that the fall in women's employment amounted to a 1 percent drop year-on-year in the same period.