Pierre Achkar has his hands full. As manager of the three-and-a-half-year-old, 112-room Monroe Hotel, ravaged by the explosion that killed former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, he has been overseeing the hotel’s renovation, refurbishment and reopening. Wearing his hat as the head of the Lebanese Hotel Owners’ Association he must direct efforts to minimize overall hotel and tourist sector fallout from the assassination, subsequent bombings, political instability and freefall of investor and tourist confidence. And somewhere he must also find the time to keep an eye on his other concern, the Printania Hotel, in the mountain resort of Broummana. EXECUTIVE spoke to Achkar about the impact of the turbulent last three-and-a-half months on the Monroe Hotel and on the hotel and tourism sector as a whole. Can you give a rough estimate of the cost to the hotel sector of the last three-and-a-half months? The four hotels on the Corniche affected
