It comes without surprise that Malaysian passport holders are facing increasing restrictions on the countries they can visit — the latest to impose visa restrictions is Canada.

However, I fear this won't be the last. The European Union and even New Zealand may follow suit. This is a real loss to our country as we will be increasingly isolated from many parts of the developed world.

From our independence right up to the 1980s, Malaysian passport holders had among the widest range of developed countries any Asian passport holder could aspire to travel to without visa requirements. That was because Malaysia was seen largely as a progressive, secular state with relatively clean passport issuing policies and tight border controls.

Unfortunately, that is not the case today.

In the words of the Canadian immigration minister, "the Malaysian passport and passport issuing system are vulnerable to abuse."

This is not news to me. Aside from our increasingly porous borders and lax citizenship and passport issuance to nationals from other Islamic countries (read: Bosnians, Indonesians, Bangladeshis and Pakistanis, some of whom are wanted in their own countries for terrorist activities), Malaysia's Islamic rhetoric and chest-thumping is fast becoming a liability in the eyes of the international community especially since Sept 11 and particularly the video revelation that several of the hijackers were hosted by Malays in Malaysia months before the attacks.

One of the most vivid images of the time which I can't erase from my mind till today is that of a Malay youth in front of a street stall selling Osama bin Laden T-shirts. The picture appeared on the Financial Times last year.

As if this is not bad enough for our image abroad, we continue to give Middle Eastern visitors unrestricted, visa-free travel into Malaysia. It is no accident that the developed world is clamping down on visitors from these countries: the bulk of the Sept 11 hijackers and their supporters originated from Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

Let's stop blaming the foreign media for our self-created negative image within the international community — we do a pretty good job ourselves without their help. My Malaysian friends working abroad testify to the various jibes and lampooning of Malaysia as state-friendly to Islamic terrorists.

Despite the Malaysian government's hard work in rooting out violent religious radicals, all the good work is being undone by poor public relations and counter-productive policies.

It is no credit for Malaysia to be blacklisted and lumped together with Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Syria, North Korea, Cuba, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, Yemen, Egypt, Somalia, Pakistan and Indonesia as places where unexplained visits can cause immigration officials from other countries to start asking tough questions.

Due to this visa-free entry policy for Middle Eastern visitors, Malaysia is seen as an easy staging point for violent Islamic radicals from the Middle East wanting to enter target developed countries.

As such, the open-door policy in most developed countries toward Malaysians in the past will be increasingly shut. This has an obvious cost on Malaysians wanting to travel to these countries to study, to do business or to work.

Of course, supporters of this policy will point out the economic benefits to Malaysia of increased tourist and business dollars from the Middle East.

What they fail to point out is that it comes at a terrible cost to Malaysians themselves: The increasing imposition of visa restrictions of Malaysian passport holders to developed countries.

How do we expect to become a developed nation by 2020 if we are restricted from travelling to developed nations to accrue the necessary intellectual and business capital to do so? I cannot help but wonder if we have shot ourselves in the foot again.