Turkish Culture and Tourist Office Gets New Director

The Ministry of Culture and Tourism of the Republic of Turkey has appointed Nihan Bekar as the new Director of the Turkish Culture and Tourist Office in New York. In this role Bekar is responsible for overseeing the country’s tourism marketing strategy in the United States and Canada. The appointment was a promotion from Bekar’s previous role as Deputy Director; the Ministry has brought Ms. M. Tolunay Yilmaz from their head office in Ankara to serve in this position in the New York office. 
 
Bekar has worked with Turkey’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism since 2002. She held various positions in the Ministry’s Foreign Affairs Department until December 2007, when the Ministry appointed her to the Office of Culture and Tourism in New York.
 
Yilmaz joined the Ministry of Culture and Tourism in 2004. In her five years in the Ministry, she has served as a Culture and Tourism expert for the General Directorate of Promotion, and as a coordinator of a European Union Working Group responsible for working toward Turkey’s potential membership in the EU.