KUALA LUMPUR Malaysia's five-year-old international airport said passenger traffic in 2002 grew 12 percent from the previous year to 16.33 million despite the sluggish global industry.

But the figure was lower than the 18 million targetted by the Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) after embarking on a RM10 million marketing campaign last year.

Passenger traffic in 2001 was 14.54 million.

"Despite the industry sluggishness arising out of the September 11 tragedy and the recent Bali incident, KLIA's performance for 2002 has been remarkable," it said in a statement released by Bernama news agency yesterday.