German tour operator cancel trips to Indonesia

German tour operator cancel trips to Indonesia

Agencies, Frankfurt

German tourism operator TUI AG has canceled all trips to the Indonesian island of Bali this week following Saturday's suspected terrorist attacks, German news agency VWD reported Monday.

Other German tourism operators, such as Thomas Cook AG and Deutsche Lufthansa AG, said their services were unchanged given a lack of cancellations by customers as of Monday morning.

Thomas Cook said its call-center hadn't reported trip cancellations, spokesman Markus Ruediger said. Of the company's 500 customers now in Bali, none had yet decided to leave the island, he said.

Of the 100 Thomas Cook customers who booked their trips from Germany, one person was missing and one injured, Ruediger said.

Thomas Cook, which is jointly owned by Lufthansa and KarstadtQuelle AG, hasn't canceled trips to Bali, but is offering free cancellations or rebookings to all customers set to travel through the end of the month.

TUI canceled all its trips to Bali this week, promising to either give customers their money back or book them on trips to other vacation destinations.

Of about 200 Germans who were on TUI vacations in Bali when the bombs went off, four decided to cut short their trips and were flown home, news agency VWD reported.

Meanwhile, Greece Monday warned its nationals to avoid traveling to Indonesia and the tourist island of Bali.

Government spokesman Christos Protopappas said a Greek tourist was injured in Saturday's bombing and at least one Greek with a Swedish passport was missing.

Separately, Lonely Planet guides, the bible of adventurous globetrotting, urged travelers Monday to avoid Bali.

"Tourists are advised to delay any trips to Bali until more is known about the recent attacks," it said.

Meanwhile, organizers had decided to move an international energy conference from Bali to Singapore.

The Seventh Annual Condensate Forum on Oct. 24-25 has been shifted to Singapore for the safety of the 100 delegates expected to attend, said Vimla Mulchand, director of the Singapore-based organizer, Conference Connection Administrators.

Mulchand said it was "the best solution, since most of the international delegates were going to fly to Bali via Singapore."