Press Release
February 19, 2001
Sol Meliá has announced the signature of a management agreement with the company Salloum & Company for
its first hotel in Lebanon: the Meliá Riviera. The announcement was made during a press conference held
in Beirut attended by the Sol Meliá Executive Vice President for European Resorts, Marcello Pigozzo, and
the new General Manager of the Meliá Riviera, Ghassan Naaman.
This luxury hotel, already in operation, provides 120 rooms right on the seafront and only 5 minutes from the
centre of Beirut. Its excellent facilities for meetings and congresses make the Meliá Riviera an ideal choice
for both business and leisure travellers.
According to Pigozzo, “the take-over of the Meliá Riviera confirms Sol Meliá’s interest in increasing
its penetration in the Mediterranean region, and area which, together with European capital cities, Latin America
and the Caribbean, is the focus of company growth objectives”.
Lebanon, a country with tremendous tourism potential
Lebanon is a multi-ethnic and cosmopolitan destination with a population of 3 million located midway between the
eastern and western hemispheres. It is home to a wealth of monuments and other reminders of ancient cultures (Roman,
Phoenician, Ottoman, ...), making it a first class destination for cultural tourism, along with mountain sports
and business events. According to the World Tourism Organisation almost 700,000 tourists visited the Lebanon in
1999, a 12.2% increase over the previous year.
HOTEL MELIÁ RIVIERA:
Sol Meliá in the Mediterranean
With the take-over of the Meliá Riviera, Sol Meliá now operates 234 hotels in 9 countries in the
Mediterranean with over 57,000 rooms.
Country Hotels Rooms Croatia 27 12,674 Egypt 1 346 France 9 599 Italy 1 282 Lebanon 1 120 Morocco 3 841 Spain 167 35,690 Tunisia 18 5,651 Turkey 5 1,369 Total 234 57,572
Sol Meliá currently provides more than 330 hotels in 30 countries on 4 continents and is the leading hotel
company in Spain, Latin America and the Caribbean, the second largest in Europe and number ten in the world. The
company is also considered the largest resort hotel company in the world.
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Contact:
prensa@solmelia.com www.solmelia.com