Manado warns travel warning retracted
Manado warns travel warning retracted
MANADO, North Sulawesi (JP): 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.
He said he would be happy to see the U.S. Embassy assign some
of its people to check the actual situation in the province.
While it is true that North Sulawesi's Minggas island in
Sangihe Talaud district shares a border with the Philippines, the
area is virtually free from the influence of the Abu Sayyaf and
the MNLF as the border area is invariably tightly patrolled by
local police and the Navy, he noted.
In 2000, police raided the island and seized 20 rifles
smuggled in from the Philippines, he said, adding that the rifles
had no connection whatsoever to any Philippine terrorist group.
In Cebu in the south of the Philippines, for example, guns are
widely made as household products and smuggled to many places, he
said.
Meanwhile, the Philippine consul general for Manado, Ronaldo
Martines, was unavailable for comment on the matter. (48)