"The quarantine task force should be stationed at every entry point that admits overseas travelers to Indonesia as deployment of the task force outside the entry points would be of no use," COVID-19 Handling Task Force's Behavior Change Department Head, Sonny Harry Harmadi, told Antara on Thursday.
Harmadi expressed confidence that the police's involvement in quarantine control would enhance the monitoring efforts at every entry point.
"On-site monitoring at present is not 100-percent effective, so the police's involvement in the process would enhance monitoring efforts. It is essential for us to ensure effective quarantine enforcement and monitoring at every entry point," the department head affirmed.
Earlier, the Jakarta Police Public Relations Department Head Senior Commissioner Yusri Yunus confirmed that the police will establish a quarantine task force at entry points under its jurisdiction and be ready to enforce quarantine requirements for all arriving travelers.
"The task force's duty is to monitor every passenger to comply with the quarantine requirement. We will coordinate with the central task force team to access the passengers' manifest data to perform the checks," Yunus stated in Jakarta on Monday (Oct 18).
The national COVID-19 Task Force has designated eight air, sea, and land entry points to admit overseas travelers to Indonesia. The entry points are the Soekarno-Hatta and Samratulangi airports in Banten and North Sulawesi; Batam, Tanjung Pinang, and Nunukan ports in Riau Islands and North Kalimantan; and two land border crossings in West Kalimantan.
Arriving overseas travelers are required to undergo a five-day quarantine, with a one-year prison sentence and a maximum Rp100 million (around US$7,000) fine penalty imposed as per the Health Quarantine Law on those violating the quarantine requirement.
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Translator: Livia Kristianti, Nabil Ihsan
Editor: Sri Haryati
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