AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, Tue Apr 17, 2007 10:17 AM ET
US warns citizens not to use Indonesian airlines
[PHOTO: AFP/File Photo: A view of the US embassy in Jakarta. The United States
Tuesday advised its citizens...]
JAKARTA (AFP) - The United States Tuesday advised its citizens not to use
Indonesian airlines after a spate of accidents including two disasters which have cost
more than 120 lives this year.
Washington has downgraded Indonesian airlines' safety rating and Americans should
use other carriers when visiting the country, the US embassy here said in a
statement.
"On April 16, 2007, the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) announced that it
has revised Indonesia's safety oversight category from Category 1 to Category 2," said
the statement posted on the embassy's website.
"Whenever possible, Americans travelling to and from Indonesia should fly directly to
their destinations on international carriers from countries whose civil aviation
authorities meet international aviation safety standards," it said.
Indonesia has been hit by a string of deadly transport accidents including plane
crashes, raising doubts about the enforcement of safety standards.
A Garuda jet burst into flames and shot off the runway in the city of Yogyakarta last
month, killing 21 people.
On New Year's Day an Adam Air Boeing 737-400 carrying 102 people disappeared
from the skies, with only small pieces of the plane found since.
Indonesia is also subject to a litany of minor plane accidents. Last week a Garuda
plane landed with a burst tyre and in February, an Adam Air craft's fuselage bent
badly on landing. No one was hurt in those incidents.
Tuesday's statement said the FAA based its safety downgrade on a controversial
audit from the Indonesian civil aviation agency which revealed that none of the nation's
54 airlines had met all minimum safety standards.
Last month's audit from the Indonesian Directorate General of Civil Aviation also
issued a warning to several airlines to comply with standards in three months or face
closure.
The statement came just hours after Transport Minister Hatta Radjasa pledged to
significantly improve safety standards by 2009 in the wake of the accidents.
Radjasa said his office has devised a "roadmap" that included improving air traffic
control systems and runways at airports and expertise of aviation sector staff.
He also pledged to swiftly hand down sanctions for breaches of safety regulations and
to make public reports into serious accidents.
The minister promised to release the voice box recorder on last month's ill-fated
Garuda plane once a final report into the cause of the accident was completed.
Radjasa said Indonesia needed private-sector assistance in upgrading transport
infrastructure, with most Indonesian planes about 20 years old and railway tracks that
dated back to the Dutch colonial era.
He said the government plans to increase the transport budget by 50 percent. "We
believe and understand that safety and security are two of the most important factors
in any transport sector," he told reporters.
Indonesia, an archipelago nation of more than 17,000 islands, relies largely on air
transportation.
Deregulation of the industry in 1997 gave rise to a rapid growth in air travel, triggering
price wars and, experts say, compromising safety standards in the drive for profit.
Copyright © 2007 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved.
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