Agence France-Presse . Nairobi

Tourist arrivals in Uganda have dropped by up to 30 per cent since post-election violence in neighbouring Kenya rocked the region, tourism officials said Friday. 'Our numbers of tourists have gone down by 20, 30 per cent,' Edwin Muzahura, spokesman for the Uganda Tourist Board, told AFP.

According to the board, tourism is the fastest-growing sector in Uganda and more than half a million arrivals in 2007 injected 375 million dollars into the economy. The country is a popular tourist destination thanks to its gorillas, chimpanzee sanctuaries and waterfalls.

'We have suffered a lot - Uganda is largely marketed through Kenya,' Muzahura said. Foreign tour operators often organise holiday packages that include both countries, beginning on Kenya's beaches and ending in Uganda's gorilla-inhabited forests. But Kenya's December 27 elections, which saw incumbent president Mwai Kibaki re-elected in a race opposition leader Raila Odinga alleged was rigged, broke into country-wide riots and tribal revenge killings.

Images of hacked Kenyans and women and children burnt alive scared off visitors during east Africa's peak tourism season. Close to 800 people have been killed and a quarter of a million uprooted by Kenya's political crisis.

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