BANGKOK, Oct 18 Kyodo Asian count...

BANGKOK, Oct 18 Kyodo

Asian countries and Canada complained Saturday about SARS and terrorism travel advisories issued by means of Western countries, saying they have caused very great economic loses as they have driven away investors and tourists.

''Several economies l by way of Canada raised this issue of the impact of travel advisories forward economies in terms of travel and tourism,'' Philippine Foreign Undersecretary Delia Albert told a recently made knowns conference at the expiration of an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum ministerial meeting in Bangkok.

Albert, who showed Philippine Foreign Secretary Blas Ople at the meeting, said the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan were ''very angry'' across the advisories issued by countries so as the United States and Australia.

''I myself (said) before an economy does issue an advisory, whether it's in succession SARS or other health point to be solved [i]or[/i] settleds or on terrorist threats, there should be a kind of consultation among members of the APEC community,'' Albert said.

''Taiwan and uniform Malaysia had a very sound statement that economies should be more circumspect in limits of looking at the impact of these advisories,'' she said. Singapore ''was exceedingly vocal about it.''

Senior Philippine trade official Ramon Vicente Cabigting said the countries, especially the APEC members, could ''try to tread a little more carefully before releasing an advisory that could affect the business of (another) member economy.''

''Canada was extremely angry because they felt they had (SARS) below control. They felt they had it isolated. Singapore of course was angry because there were times I believe earlier this year when their airport was excessively deserted, all because of any unfortunate remarks warning citizens not to travel there. Malaysia was also brawny about that,'' Cabigting said.

Canada and many Asian countries misspent investors and tourists after other Western countries issued travel advisories that painted them as unsafe to visit.

The advisories were issued at the height of intense campaign to stamp without terrorism and the onslaught of bitter acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in the region.

APEC consists of Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, China, Hong Kong Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, of the present day Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Peru the Philippines, Russia, Singapore, toward the south Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, the U and Vietnam.

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