Aruba´s Tourism Department decided to close its office in Argentina next May 6 as a result of the sector´s hard-hitting crisis in the region and pricked by a steady trickledown in the number of Argentine tourists traveling to the Caribbean island nation.

Marcos Sydor, chief of Aruba´s office in Argentina, appreciated the collaboration of those persons and institutions that did their best to make the island one of the top travel choices for Argentines.

Thousands of travelers are constantly shifting their Middle East reservations to spend their vacations in European, Caribbean or Latin American countries as the U.S. war against Iraq is chasing them away, sources close to all major world tourist companies warned in Germany.

One of the 35 members of the Niles Canyon Railway Museum in California who got a special permit to travel to Cuba, paid a visit to the city of Ciego de Avila to check firsthand the running of old-timed steam locomotives that still chug their way down the tracks to pitch a hand in the sugar harvest there. These time-stricken engine have become must-sees for an increasingly larger amount of tourists.

The American delegation toured sugar mills and railroad workshops in the province of Ciego de Avila some 430 kilometers east of Havana.

Even though Puerto Rico´s tourist industry has not been hamstrung by the war in Iraq, the picture for the coming months -especially after the Holy Week season- appears quite bleak, according to Rick Newman, chairman of the nation´s Hotel and Tourism Association.

Mr. Newman commented local lodging facilities are beginning to see less up-front reservations, especially for the second half of April.

For the Holy Week holiday season, most establishments -big and small alike- expect to nick high occupancy rates in the neighborhood of 95 to 100 percent.

Miguel Mirones Diez has taken over as president of the Spanish Tourism Quality Institute (ICET) on the heels of its Board of Directors´ biennial renovation meeting. D. Hans Veyrat was elected the institute´s vice president, while Jose Manuel Asin and Placido Caballero were voted in as secretary and treasurer, respectively.

Lufthansa has just nabbed a couple of awards that serve well to beef up its prestige worldwide. The Germany-based airline won the Five Star Diamond Award granted by the American Academy of Hospitality Sciences for the excellence in both quality and services. On the other hand, the latest issue of Fortune magazine places Lufthansa on top of the world ranking among commercial carriers.