CAIRO, Dec. 28 (Aswat Masriya) – Egyptian Tourism Minister Hisham Zaazou decided Monday to cut souvenir shops' license fees by 50 percent for three years starting January.

The decision aims to ease the burden on the owners of tourist shops in light of the current circumstances, the ministry of tourism stated in statement that was made available to Aswat Masriya.

The statement pointed out that the ministry has received numerous complaints coming from a number of provinces where tourism is a key industry, in addition to complaints from Luxor’s shop owners who have borne the brunt of the setback that the tourism sector is currently witnessing.

Many owners of souvenir shops are increasingly unable to afford licensing expenses, the statement added.

Egyptian tourism was slowly inching towards recovery when a Russian plane crashed in Sinai on October 31, killing all 224 people on board. Egypt fears that the ramifications of this incident will inflict damage on its tourism sector, a vital source of much-needed hard currency.

Two weeks after the crash, the Kremlin announced the results of its own investigation which found that the Russian plane was downed by an act of terrorism with a homemade bomb planted on the jet. However, Egypt maintains that there is no evidence that the incident was caused by a terrorist attack. 

In November, UK suspended flights to the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh and Russia suspended all flights to Egypt.