BATAM, Riau: The Muslim community here has been warned about

BATAM, Riau: The Muslim community here has been warned about
restaurants that claim to serve halal (allowed by Islamic law)
food but do not have a halal certificate from the Indonesian
Ulemas Council (MUI).

"We must be cautious about halal labels in restaurants that do
not have a certificate from the food survey department of the
MUI," the chairman of the Batam Muslim Consumers Foundation,
Imbalo Iman Sakti, said here on Tuesday.

Imbalo cited several restaurants that claimed to serve halal
food but did not have a certificate.

He said such restaurants only used the halal label to attract
customers.

Since the beginning of the fasting month, he said, many
restaurants had put up halal labels on their doors, hoping to
attract more Muslim diners.

Imbalo said many of these restaurants belonged to non-Muslims,
who added pork, alcohol and others ingredients to the food they
served to make it more appetizing.

He said the restaurant owners were aware that the ingredients
they used could not be eaten by Muslims, yet they still put up
halal labels in their restaurants. -- Antara