JAKARTA ~

The Indonesian plan to execute two Australian nationals on death-row convicts for a drug case has not reduced Australian tourist visits to Bali.

“This indicates that Australian tourists are ignoring warnings against visiting Indonesia, particularly Bali,” tourism observer Tjok Gede Agung told Antara Bali over the weekend.

In January 2015, Bali recorded 85,059 tourist arrivals from Australia. During the past two months, Australian tourists visiting the province were the highest among other foreign tourist arrivals, reaching 156,424, up 16.74 percent from the same period last year, when their number was recorded a 133,966.

Further, Australian tourist arrivals were the highest among foreign tourists arriving from different countries.

They accounted for 24.41 percent of the total number of foreign tourists arriving in the first two months of 2015, which stood at 640,739.

The highest number of Australian tourists arriving in Bali was followed by the number of tourists coming from China, which stood at 145,747 during the same period (January and February, 2015).

The number of Japanese tourists visiting Bali has also begun to increase since the opening of regular direct flight from Japan to Denpasar.

In the January – February 2015 period, the number of Japanese tourists was recorded on the third biggest list, recording 40,544 arrivals, followed by that of South Korea which stood at 28,523.

The political issues are expected to not affect the foreign tourist arrivals in Bali. Therefore Agung hoped that the government, tourism operators and the people should continue to increase the quality of their services.

“This needs to be done because Bali still constitutes the main destination of foreign tourists in Indonesia,” he said.