YOGYAKARTA: Calls by Indonesian vice president Jusuf Kalla to revise upward the current target of Indonesia’s 5.5 million foreign visitors in 2007 to 7 million are unlikely to be met following the crash of the Garuda Indonesia jet and the loss of 22 lives last week.
Yogyakarta governor Sultan Hamengku Buwono X said his province’s tourism had been seriously affected by a series of disasters that had hit the region recently.
“A series of natural disasters such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, cold lava streams, whirlwinds and the crash of a Garuda Indonesia airplane has affected Yogyakarta’s tourism,” Hamengku Buwono told the Jakarta Post.
“One disaster happened after another over a relatively short period of time. Hardly had we begun to recover from one disaster or another happened,” he said.
Yogyakarta is one of Indonesia’s most visited cities, especially for access to the nearby Buddhist temple of Borobudur and the Hindu temple of Prambanan.
