Acting Police Commissioner McDonald Jacob says while he hoped TT would not rank as high in certain categories of crime, it was important to avoid misinterpreting global crime rankings.

On Wednesday a US State Department's travel advisory called on Americans to reconsider travel to Trinidad and Tobago because of crime.

Responding to the advisory during a media briefing at the Police Training Academy, St James, on Friday, Jacob said he was not proud of the advisory.

Referring to global crime rankings given to different countries on websites, he said one such website placed Trinidad as being number 14 for murders and number six for other serious crimes.

He urged the public to consider that these crime rankings were generated as a result of arrests and charges brought by the police.

"It is not just looking at the crimes that are committed, but we are looking at the crimes that the police may solve.

"Let us say we hold 600 people for firearm possession, that will be counted because we charged.

"If we hold a lot of people for fraud offences or solve a lot of fraud offences, it will be there (on the website), so we are number six and we understand that.

"We would not like to be number six, we would like to be lower, but they look at the general numbers."

Jacob also urged the public to be careful when interpreting and repeating the figures presented, as without context they could do more harm than good.