KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 1 — The Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL) is targetting to get 15 million tourists to visit the federal capital this year in conjunction with Visit Malaysia Year 2014.

Kuala Lumpur Mayor Datuk Seri Ahmad Phesal Talib said DBKL was targetting 10.1 million international tourists and 4.9 million domestic tourists, who were expected to bring in revenue estimated at RM24.9 billion.

In 2012, the city recorded 14 million tourist arrivals, comprising 9.3 million foreign tourists and 4.7 million domestic tourists, who brought in revenue of RM19.8 billion, he added.

He told this to reporters after launching the calendar of events and festivals in Kuala Lumpur for 2014 at the KL Sentral station here.

On last night’s incident at Dataran Merdeka, where the New Year’s eve concert there had to be called off when protesters broke through the police cordon to seize the stage, Ahmad Phesal hoped it would not mar efforts by the government to get more tourists to come to the country.

In another development, he said DBKL received 153,758 protest letters on the hike in assessment rate of properties in the city. — Bernama