Manado wants travel warning retracted

Manado wants travel warning retracted

MANADO, North Sulawesi: Provincial police chief Brig. Gen.
Erald Dotulong wants the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta to retract its
travel warning which advises American citizens against visiting
the province on the grounds of alleged threats posed by the
Philippine Abu Sayyaf guerrilla group.

The travel warning, as reported by local daily Manado Post
last week, advises U.S. citizens not to visit Maluku, Irian Jaya
or Central Sulawesi for security reasons. It also warns U.S.
citizens against visiting North Sulawesi, an Indonesian province
that shares a border with the Philippines, where the Abu Sayyaf
group has subjected U.S. citizens to abduction and intimidation.

Dotulong regretted the issuance of the travel warning,
dismissing it as groundless as the province had never been of any
interest to Abu Sayyaf terrorists or Moro separatists under the
Mindanao National Liberation Front (MNLF).

"I hope the U.S. Embassy will review and perhaps retract its
incorrect statement about North Sulawesi," he said, adding that
despite several attempts, he had yet to get through to the U.S.
Embassy to clarify the matter. (48)