Fewer nights spent in European Union hotels in 2009. - The decline in the number of hotel nights in the EU27, which began in the middle of 2008, slowed down during 2009, explains the EU's statistical office, Eurostat, in a recent report (Tourism in Europe: First results for 2009). In 2009, nearly 1.5 billion nights were spent in hotels and similar establishments in the EU27, a decrease of 5.1% compared with 2008, after an annual change of -0.2% in 2008 and +3.5% in 2007. The number of hotel nights spent by residents in their own country in 2009 fell by 1.6% and hotel nights spent by non-residents fell by 9.1%. The number of nights spent in hotels in 2009 fell in all member states, except Sweden (+0.1%). The largest decreases were recorded in Latvia (-23.3%), Lithuania (-20.4%), Cyprus (-19.7%) and Slovakia (-18.1%), and the smallest in Germany (-1.4%), the United Kingdom (-1.7%), Slovenia (-2.1%) and Austria (-2.9%). Amongst the member states, the highest numbers of nights spent in hotels in 2009 were recorded in Spain (251 million nights, -6.5% compared with 2008), Italy (238 million, -4.3%), Germany (216 million, -1.4%), France (191 million, -5.6%) and the United Kingdom (170 million, -1.7%). These five countries accounted for more than 70% of the total number of hotel nights in the EU27. (I.L./transl.fl)