REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, TANJUNGPINANG -- More than 1.85 million foreign tourists visited Riau Islands province last year, up 5.18 percent from 1.76 million a year earlier, according to statistical data.

Batam municipality and Bintan district saw the number of tourist arrivals rise 9.58 percent and 29.91 percent respectively, however, the number of tourists visiting other municipalities and districts in the province fell 5.47 percent, Head of the Central Statistics Agency (BPS) Office in Riau Islands Province Dumangar Hutauruk said here on Tuesday.

"The number of tourist arrivals in Tanjungpinang municipality and Karimun district dropped 4.04 percent and 2.43 percent respectively," he said.

On a monthly basis, the number of tourist arrivals in the province in December 2013 jumped 24.28 percent to 206,747 from 166,361 in November 2013, he said.

"Compared to the same month in 2012, the number of tourist arrivals in Riau Islands in December 2013 also represented an 8.66 percent increase," he said.

Dumangar said neighboring Singapore remained the most important source of tourist arrivals in Riau Islands. In 2013, 952,343 Singaporean tourists made up 51.23 percent of the tourists visiting the province.

Malaysia came in second with 14.72 percent of the overall tourist arrivals. Meanwhile, tourist arrivals from China, South Korea, India, the Philippines, Japan, the United Kingdom, Australia and the United States respectively contributed an average of 5 percent to the total tourist arrivals.

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