(1/19/2008) Travel Trade Gazette's (TTG) Mimi Hudoyo reports that the Indonesian Department of Culture and Tourism is seeking agreement to change current visa regulations to permit visa-free short visits from 10 countries. If the proposal submitted to the Ministry of Law and Human Rights is successful, the citizens of Australia, China, Japan, South Korea, India, U.K., Germany, France, the Netherlands and Russia would be able to undertake holiday visits without having to purchase either a 7 or 30-day visa at the Indonesian port of entry as required under the visa-on-arrival policy now in place. Currently, 63 countries are eligible to pay a fee of US$10 for a 7-day visa or US$25 for a 30-day visa.

According to TTG, the move by the Ministry is in support of the goal to bring 7 million foreign tourists to Indonesia in 2008. "Other efforts include increasing immigration counters at Soekarno-Hatta Jakarta and Ngurah Rai Bali airports; encouraging airlines, both domestic and international, to open or increase services to tourist detonations; and placing multilingual information boards (Arabic, Japanese and Mandarin other than English and Bahasa Indonesia) in the two major airports," reports TTG.