Dangerous Tourism In Malaysia

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   On February 28th the Department of Foreign Affairs of the Australian Government warned people about the risk of traveling to Malaysia, in particular to the resorts in the state of Sabah located on Borneo Island, pointing out frequent cases of kidnapping in the region. The South – Eastern Asia is very popular among the Australians therefore it is clear the Government of the country pays attention to the safety of its people.
    However, according to tour operating companies, which specialize in the South-Eastern market, although they take such warnings into account, in majority of cases they consider the danger to be exaggerated. Marina Rudakova, Supervisor of the South-Eastern Area Department of UTE Megapolus group, gave the following example: ‘last week there was information regarding the introduction of emergency situation in the Philippines where we had sent a group of travel agencies directors. When they came back they were surprised at the fomented panic’.
    Meanwhile, the reaction of Australian hoteliers on such signals might be beneficial for the Russian travel market. ‘A few years ago Australian companies cancelled all tours to Indonesia due to the information about the epidemic there. As a result local hoteliers put on sale many special offers for Russian companies’, said Alexandra Plyaskina, General director of Spark Group. It is interesting, that sometimes the Governments of other English-speaking countries make similar warnings. For example, on February 27th governmental Department of the USA recommended to abstain from going to certain regions of Israel.