The number of Japanese tourists visiting Bali in 2017 rose 7.65 percent to 253,000 from around 235,000 in the previous year.  Head of the Bali branch of th Central Bureau of Statistics (BPS) Adi Nugroho said in Denpasar on Sunday (18/2) that most of them flew in here directly from Japan with only 651 by tourist boats. apanese were the fourth largest foreign tourists in number after Chinese, Australians and Indians. Japanese tourists made up 4.44 percent of the total number of 5.69 million foreign tourists visiting Bali in 2017.  Earlier head of the Bali Tourism Office AA Yuniarta Putra said he hoped Japan Airlines (JAL) would serve regular flights between Bali and Japan. Yuniarta said Garuda Indonesia and Japan-based airline ANA (All Nippon Airlines) and Air Asia already served regular flight between Bali and Tokyo and Osaka. Indians accounted for 4.79 percent of the total number of foreign tourists visiting Bali in 2017. The eight countries of origin included China, India, Japan up 7.69 percent, Britain up 10.07 percent, The United States 12.11 percent, France 7.61 percent, Germany 15.11 percent and South Korea 15.45 percent. (ROL)