Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond said officials “have not taken this decision lightly but our first priority will always be the safety of our citizens”.
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Tunisia attack: Foreign Office advises against travel to counrty.
The Foreign Office had previously advised against travel to certain hotspots, including near the borders with Algeria and Libya, but now urged Britons to keep away from the whole of the country unless they had essential business.
The Foreign Office estimates there are up to 3,000 British tourists now in Tunisia, and a few hundred British residents live there, The BBC reports.
This is the rationale behind the 30-day state of emergency that President Beji Caid Essebsi declared on Saturday.
“If you’re in Tunisia and you don’t have an essential need to remain you should leave by commercial means”, the statement said.
At the Riu Palace Hammamet Marhaba in coastal Hammamet, southeast of Tunis, receptionist Hamdi Mohsen said that since the attack in Sousse, business is down like he’s never seen before in his 34 years working at the resort.
Both Thomas Cook and TUI, which operates Thomson and First Choice holidays, said they had cancelled all future bookings to the country up until the end of October.
Travelling to Tunisia now would be likely to invalidate travel insurance policies, but most policies would provide cover for those now in the country, it added.
In announcing the urgent reinstatement of 30 days of security measures that were lifted In March a year ago, he said terrorists pose an existential threat to the North African nation.
The Department of Foreign Affairs said it is “urgently reviewing its travel advice in consultation with the appropriate agencies”. “You should be especially vigilant at this time and follow the advice of Tunisian security authorities and your tour operator”.
Since 2011, when mass protests led to the ouster of entrenched Tunisian dictator Zine Abidine Ben Ali and ushered in the country’s fledgling democratic transition, ultraconservative Salafists have found more space and traction within Tunisian society.
A spokesman said the airline is cancelling all flights to Enfidha for the rest of the summer season with “immediate effect”.
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‘But when we have tourists who are specially targeted and a police who clearly is not yet in ability to defend them properly in the light of all their shortcomings, such a campaign encouraging tourists to continue to come, seems to me still premature.’.
