Malaysia is one of the most favoured tourist destinations for GCC tourists especially UAE nationals, with Southeast Asian country receiving over 14,000 UAE travellers in 2016, said an industry expert.

Mohamed Taib Ibrahim, director of Malaysia Tourism Promotion, said: "Last year the number of GCC tourists in Malaysia amounted to 287,398, among which 14,150 visitors were from the UAE alone. We expect that these figures will increase in coming years.”

Taib said that Malaysian participation at the Arabian Travel Market (ATM) will be big where the stand area is 400-sq-m.

Malaysia recently participated in the eighth edition of Explore and Experience Travel exhibition in Dubai. The three-day exhibition was held at Dubai’s famous City Walk and saw the participation of other popular destinations including Hong Kong Tourism Board, Beverly Hills Conference and visitors Bureau and Turkey Cultural & Information Office.

Mohamed Jassim Al Rais, deputy Managing Director for Al Rais Tours & Holidays-  the organizer of this B2C Travel event - said: “It was one of the most successful exhibitions visited by a big number of attendees from different nationalities specially from UAE nationals."

"The most requested destinations during Spring vacation by the end of this month were Azerbaijan, Malaysia, Thailand and Hong Kong," Al Rais said.

A promotion launched by Al Rais Tours during the exhibition will run through March. It offers tourists value added services through the packages which include travel ticket, hotel booking and city tours. - TradeArabia News Service