Peter Fankhauser’s comments came after the group reported growth in bookings to smaller destinations such as Croatia and Italy, as well as Tunisia “which has made a positive start after we reopened it to the UK market in February”.

Asked whether he envisaged further growth in capacity to Tunisia from Cook, Fankhauser said: “We started Tunisia [in 2018] with three flights a week and have increased to 11 flights this summer.

“That is exactly what we see as good demand.

“You can’t imagine how our customers have been received from the Tunisians. That was almost heart-breaking.

“They depend on tourism and what we are doing there is supporting the government’s project for training people in the hotels – mainly in our own-branded.

“We have really close contact with Tunisia and have a great interest in making this destination really a top destination again – back to what it was.”