Malaysians Among Highest Number Of Tourists To U.S.

KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 17 (Bernama) -- Malaysians accounted for 44,000 visitors to the United States of America (USA) for the period January to October this year, placing Malaysia as the second highest after China, said United States Embassy Consul General Timothy Scherer. Scherer said the number was a 20 percent increase compared with last year. "This situation showed to the world that there is no prejudice on Malaysian tourists, especially Muslims, to visit US," he said at a talk on 'Travel USA-All You Need To Know' at the National Press Club (NPC) here, Friday. He said the application procedure for visa was not complicated even though there is a myth about it. "One of the myth is regarding interview sessions which people believed comprised a though question session. "It is actually a quick interview session which is short and easy, such as the purpose of visit, the place to visit and so on... it need to be answered by the applicants and convince the officer in-charge," he said. Furthermore, there are no different procedures to apply visa and applicants from any religion will follows the same criteria. "US Embassy does not discriminate tourists with a Muslim name because surname is very common and we have our own database to determine the profile of applicants. "For example currently there are 20,000 students from Saudi Arabia studying in the US," he said. He also added that the US visa validity period also resulted in an increasing number of tourist arrivals to the US who return. "The validity period is 10 years compared with other countries that give approval for only a year," he said. --BERNAMA