Jakarta. South Korea is considering visa-free entry to boost the number of visitors from Indonesia, a diplomat said recently.
The policy will be reciprocal once implemented, as South Korea is one of 20 countries that enjoy Indonesia’s visa-free entry system.
“To increase mutual visits between Korea and Indonesia, it is necessary to implement visa-free entry. The Korean embassy is stepping up efforts to make that happen,” said Lee Seong-yeon, a senior official at the South Korean consulate in Jakarta who oversees visa policy.
Meanwhile, the South Korean embassy has eased visa issuance procedures for Indonesian visitors by exempting them from submitting financial documents in case of group visits.
“The Korean Embassy sincerely hopes to see increased traffic between Korea and Indonesia. We are relaxing the requirements for multiple entry visa applications by not requiring financial documents to be attached,” he said.
Indonesians visiting Jeju do not need visas, he added.
Kim Ji-seong, director of the Korea Tourism Organization’s Jakarta office, said the organization aims to increase the number of Indonesians visiting South Korea to 300,000 this year. Indonesia has been among the top 10 countries for overall foreign tourists visiting South Korea in recent years, Kim said.
According to the group’s data, about 250,000 Indonesian tourists visited South Korea last year.
“After analysing recent data, we have seen that 135,000 Indonesians have already visited Korea between January and May, so we are confident we can achieve our target,” he said.
Additionally, there are several direct flights from Indonesia to South Korean cities such as Busan.
To attract more tourists from Indonesia, Kim said the country will hold a Korean Wave Tourism Festival later this year, offering visitors a chance to enjoy traditional Korean cuisine and watch performances of popular Korean dramas and pop music.
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