PHNOM PENH, Jan. 1 (Xinhua) -- Cambodia's famed Angkor Archeological Park received 2.2 million foreign tourists in 2019, down 14.8 percent year-on-year, said a press statement on Wednesday.
The world heritage site made gross revenue of 99 million U.S. dollars from ticket sales last year, down 15 percent year-on-year, said the state-run Angkor Enterprise's statement.
China, the United States, and South Korea remained the biggest sources of foreign arrivals to the ancient park.
Cambodian Prime Minister Samdech Techo Hun Sen said in August that the slump in the number of tourists to the Angkor in northern Siem Reap province should not be a cause for concern because it was the result of a government push to diversify the kingdom's tourism offer.
"This is because we now have many other tourist destinations," he said. "The decline of tourist arrivals in Siem Reap does not mean that fewer tourists visited Cambodia."
According to the Ministry of Tourism's latest report, nearly 5.3 million international visitors came to Cambodia in the first 10 months of 2019, up 9.7 percent over the same period in the previous year.
The Angkor Archeological Park, inscribed on the World Heritage List of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in 1992, is the kingdom's most popular tourist destination.
Entrance fee to the park is 37 U.S. dollars for a one-day visit, 62 dollars for a three-day pass, and 72 dollars for a week-long pass.
