Hopes that the Indonesian island of Bali would soon feature again on the tourism map have been dashed by last week's bombing in the country's capital city Jakarta.

Before that, an increasing number of inquiries from people wanting to travel to Bali caused travel companies to query why the Foreign Office had not changed its travel advice against going to the country, in place since last October's bombing killed 200 people. Most tour operators follow the advice and will not take holidaymakers to countries considered dangerous.

'This time last week I was in a meeting discussing what our stance was on Bali, aware that customers were asking about it and that some of our competitors had started to feature it,' said Travelbag marketing director Colin Whaley. 'Now I think customer demand will fall off again and I would expect the Foreign Office's advice to remain in place for quite some time.'

The car bomb outside the Marriott Hotel in Jakarta on Tuesday killed at least 14 people. This, coupled with the fact that Amrozi bin Nurhasyim was found guilty and sentenced to death on Thursday for his part in the October Bali bombing, has further drawn attention to Indonesia.

Keith Betton, director of communications at the Association of British Travel Agents, said : 'It was going to take time to put Indonesia back on the tourism map. Now it is going to take even longer. This really illustrates that the Foreign Office is right to be cautious.'

Kuoni managing director Sue Biggs agreed: 'Between the Jakarta bombing and the publicity surrounding the trial of the Bali bombing, the outlook doesn't look very positive,' she said.

But she added that the resort was still a 'fantastic, magical destination' and that Kuoni would continue to push for a clarification from the Foreign Office about its travel advice.

The Foreign Office is warning against non-essential travel to Indonesia because of a continued high risk of terrorism. 'If you are already in Indonesia, you should consider leaving if your presence is not essential,' it adds.

However, travel company AsiaWorld said it was continuing to sell Bali to anyone who signed a disclaimer, as long as they were aware that their insurance would be invalidated.

Director and general manager Paul Tilling said that after the Jakarta bombing the company had received only one phone call from a customer due to travel to Bali asking to postpone the trip until 2004. Other travellers were happy to go ahead with travel planned for this year.

'Our product manager for the Asia programme is on holiday in Bali at the moment and I have travelled there twice since the Bali bombing,' he said. 'I would go there again tomorrow without compunction.

'Possibly this [the Jakarta bombing] does set us back,' added Tilling. 'But we would still ask the Foreign Office to lift the travel advice on Bali. We want the Bali situation to be continually reviewed and to be treated separately from the rest of Indonesia.'