269 foreigners denied entrance

JAKARTA: A total of 269 foreigners were not allowed into the country between January and August due to various immigration violations, an official said on Tuesday.

The supervision director at the Directorate General of Immigration, Zaiman Nurmatias, also said another 103 foreigners were arrested over this period for various criminal offenses.

The expatriates were barred from entering the country at Sumatra's Dumai, Tanjung Balai and Asahan seaports and Polonia airport, Kupang seaport in East Nusa Tenggara, Ngurah Rai airport in Bali, Tanjung Perak seaport in Surabaya and Soekarno-Hatta airport here, he said.

"Most of them were found in possession of bogus visas which they claimed were issued by Indonesian embassies in Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok and Beijing," Zaiman said.

He added that the majority of the foreigners came from China. (edt)