Jakarta (Antara Bali) - The Indonesian government has sent a team to Turkey to look for 16 Indonesian nationals who are "missing" in the Mediterranean country.
"There is already a team from Indonesia there to help the Turkish security authorities (find the 16 people)," Arrmanatha Nasir, a spokesman of the Indonesian foreign affairs ministry, said here, Monday.
He said Turkey is a huge country covering 770 thousand km2, and having many mountains and difficult terrain. If someone is hiding somewhere in Turkey, it is very difficult to find him or her, he added.
He said the ministry does not want to speculate about the reason why the 16 Indonesians left the tour group and up to now their whereabouts are still not known. The search and investigation are still going on, he added.
"The foreign ministry is reluctant to speculate about their motive of leaving the tour group, including about a suspicion that they might join ISIS," he noted.
In the meantime, the ministry's director for the protection of Indonesian citizens and Indonesian legal entities (PWNI-BHI), Muhammad Iqbal said, no relatives of the 16 Indonesians reported about their missing to the authorities. The ministry has not known how they were missing and could not confirm on the suspicion that they might join ISIS. (WDY)
