Fully vaccinated foreign tourists will be allowed to enter Iran again from November, the Tourism Ministry announced on Tuesday.

Visas will be given to tourists when they enter the country, the Ilna news agency cited the ministry as saying.

Iran banned the entry of foreign tourists in April 2020 because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Tourism is an important source of income for Iran, which has been in a serious economic crisis for years due to US sanctions.

According to media reports, the country had almost 9 million foreign tourists a year before the crisis. After that, however, the tourism industry collapsed.

Nearly 120,000 Covid-19-related deaths and more than 5.5 million infections have been recorded in Iran since the pandemic broke out in February of last year.

In the last few weeks, however, there has been a slight relaxation. The reason given by health experts is the arrival of foreign vaccines and the completion of domestic vaccines.

According to the Health Ministry, more than 40 per cent of more than 83 million Iranians have now been vaccinated at least once. Almost 20 per cent have received two jabs.

dpa