GILGIT: A 10-member foreign photographers’ team has arrived in Gilgit-Baltistan to capture the colours of autumn to help promote the region’s beauty abroad.

The cameramen are taking photos of mountains, cultural and historic sites, pastures, lakes, rivers and wildlife.

The tour has been organised by the Karakoram expedition, whose chairman, famous climber Mirza Ali told Dawn on Tuesday that the team was currently in Baltistan division.

He said the photographers’ team was capturing the most beautiful scenes in the region during the fall in a professional way.

The autumn season in the region is most attractive for tourists, he said, adding that summer was usually considered the tourism season in the region, but attractions of all the four seasons needed to be explored.

The main purpose of the team’s visit to GB during the autumn is to explore the natural beauty of the region in the season.

The team leader is Viktoria Rogotnenva from Russia and other members are Elena Grishina, Anna Polyakova and Mikhail Skvortsov, also from Russia; Vinogrdskiy Dmytro, Oksana Vashchuk, Oleksiy Vynogrdsky, Petro Lypko from Ukraine, Elena Roman from Moldova and Ivan Starastsin from Belarus. The team also includes five women.

The team will visit Ghanche, Skardu, Shigar, Astore, Hunza, Nagar, Gilgit and Ghizer.

Mr Ali said foreign tourists wished to visit Pakistan, but due to negative image of the country abroad they were reluctant to travel to the country.

He said the team planned to remove this wrong perception abroad by promoting tourism destinations in GB during all the four seasons.

He said it was good sign that the foreign tourists had started visiting the region in large number after the security situation improved.

The team, which arrived in GB on Oct 6, will complete the tour on Oct 20.

Published in Dawn, October 10th, 2018