Robert Go, Jakarta – Indonesia's Finance Minister said yesterday the government would demand more payments from indebted conglomerates following news that assets currently managed by the country's restructuring agency were worth only 167.7 trillion rupiah now, or a quarter of their value in 1999.

[This is an exclusive extract from "Appeasing Jakarta: Australia's Complicity in the East Timor Tragedy", the second in the Quarterly Essay series published by Black Inc., Melbourne, $9.95.]

John Birmingham – The battalion's nickname was strictly and bitterly ironic: "The Brave Ones". A fighting unit with a proud history of child murder, rape, plunder and riot.

Geoffrey Barker – It will be the ironic fate of independent East Timor to have its key international economic and security relationships with three countries responsible for much of its historic suffering: Portugal, Indonesia and Australia.

The first major trial of atrocities committed in East Timor by Indonesian forces and proxy militias got underway in Dili Tuesday, with a three-judge panel hearing preliminary issues behind closed doors.

Wens Manggut and Levi Silalahi – It is an honor to be elected a member of the House of Representatives and the salary is also considered very good. What is a House member's exact remuneration?

Ten political parties, out of the 16, registered with the Independent Electoral Commission are disappointed with the aid package made available by Untaet.

Bill Guerin, Jakarta – Board or alight wherever and whenever they like. In the middle of the road, or, if there's no room, at the roadside. At the entrance of the inner city toll road, on a roundabout, in a road junction when the lights are green, and so on. This freedom costs Jakarta bus users dearly in more ways than one.

Impeachment is not here yet. President Abdurrahman Wahid is not yet absolutely certain to fall. Megawati Sukarnoputri for now remains vice president. But that has not stopped the cross-party caucus pushing their candidates for the vice presidency under 'President Megawati'. Who are the candidates and what are their chances?

Akbar Tandjung

East Timor's 16 parties and UN transition administration have completed the draft of a "National Unity Pact", which expresses support for the election of independence leader Xanana Gusmao as the territory's first president, a Dili official said Tuesday.

It's a big cake and it's ready for the cutting, or so they think. The cake is called Megawati Sukarnoputri's presidency. It has to be shared out very carefully, each piece exactly the right size. If not the whole cake could just break up and fall apart in a big mess.

Vaudine England, Jakarta – Jakarta's long-running power struggle reached new heights of confusion yesterday as President Abdurrahm ppens – and it is certain to because there is an act of treason – then ... the special session will topple the President and our country will break apart," he said.

New York – Indonesian envoys are among the worst parking offenders here. Diplomats at the Indonesian Consulate and at Jakarta's Permanent Mission to the United Nations committed 8,966 parking violations between 1997 and last year.

Wendy Pugh, Melbourne – In an upheaval of Australia's energy market, petroleum and pipeline companies are racing to nail down multi-billion-dollar projects to deliver new supplies of gas across the country's vast distances.

Jakarta – A total of 740 people died at the hands of the national police during the past one year due to human rights abuses, the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) said.

According to the commission's record, the police allegedly committed 224 human rights violations in 10 provinces from June 2000 to June this year, resulting in 740 deaths.

Jakarta – Six people went missing Thursday after the Kijang van they rode in was attacked on the road linking Poso and Tentena in Central Sulawesi.

"The car was found on Thursday afternoon between the Watuawu-Pandiri villages. It was burned down and the six passengers were missing," spokesman of the Tadulako military resort, First Lt. Abdul Haris, told Antara Friday.

Jakarta – While the ethnic-related tension in Pontianak, West Kalimantan has gradually ceased, fresh conflict flared up in the West Kotawaringin district of Kumai in Central Kalimantan late on Saturday, leaving at least two people dead.

Chris McCall, Mamboro, Central Sulawesi – God told him the riots were about to happen. "Allah sent me a vision," Muhammad Herlambang Badja says at the psychiatric hospital where he is being treated.

Approximately 93 per cent of the estimated population in East Timor have been registered in advance of upcoming elections, the United Nations mission in the territory announced today.

Banda Aceh – At least 49 people were killed or found dead in the violence-plagued Indonesian province of Aceh during the weekend, hospital and rebel sources said Sunday.

The violence continued as representatives of the government and the separatist Free Aceh Movement (GAM) were meeting for peace talks in Geneva.

Banda Aceh – Optimism looms ahead of the upcoming two-day peace talks between the Indonesian government and the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) scheduled to take place in Geneva from Monday.

Jakarta – Corruption, collusion and nepotism are rampant in state enterprises, a top government official admits, confirming what many have long suspected.

Hamish McDonald – Senior United States and Australian officials yesterday joined in an unusually direct warning to Jakarta against trying to suppress secessionists in Aceh and Irian Jaya by force.

Peter Kerr, Jakarta – Soon after giving birth earlier this year in a major central Jakarta hospital, nursing staff gave Indra a pack containing infant milk formula, a measuring cup and other gifts provided by a big international baby-food company. Three months later, when she felt she was having difficulty breastfeeding, she started giving her baby the milk formula.

Jakarta – Madurese settlers in Indonesia's West Kalimantan province have asked the local government to give them two weeks to persuade thousands of Madurese refugees to leave their camps in Pontianak, an official said yesterday.

Jakarta – The House of Representatives' consultative body agreed on Thursday to put forward a controversial special autonomy bill for Irian Jaya proposed by Papuan legislators, but at the same time acknowledged that the government's own bill on the subject would remain the primary reference of the deliberation.

Lhokseumawe – Indonesian security forces killed 22 rebels in two separate gunbattles in Aceh province, officials said yesterday. In the most recent fighting, government soldiers shot 20 separatist guerillas in a gunbattle in central Aceh, said military spokesman Lt-Colonel Firdaus.

Jakarta – While the fate of embattled President Abdurrahman Wahid is still far from sealed, the United Development Party (PPP) and the Crescent Star Party (PBB) are already preparing to forward vice presidential candidates to partner Megawati Soekarnoputri.

Reuters in Manila – President Abdurrahman Wahid, threatened with impeachment by a hostile Parliament, offered yesterday to reconcile differences with opponents in the legislature and the military.

Mark Dodd, Dili – The United Nations has told the people of East Timor they will be virtually self-governing from September 15 – but that the UN will decide who will form the government.

The UN administration in East Timor has prepared a package of wide-ranging logistical and material aid for 16 parties and independent candidates contesting the territory's first elections, but it does not plan to provide direct financial help.

Jakarta – Court officials said yesterday that they had not lost the documentation of a Supreme Court decision ordering a fugitive son of former Indonesian President Suharto to pay nearly US$300 million in back taxes, as had been alleged by a minister. 'We sent the document back to the Jakarta state administrative court in April.

Jakarta – National Police chief Gen. Surojo Bimantoro had reportedly cut short his minor haj pilgrimage and returned to the capital on Tuesday, after receiving news that there had been a near clash among his middle-ranking officers.

Ray Brindal, Canberra – Australian and East Timorese representatives have resolved many of their outstanding differences about a planned new treaty covering royalties from energy production in the Timor Sea, Australia's Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said Thursday.

Mark Dodd, Dill – The United Nations in East Timor will encourage staff to volunteer for HIV tests but cannot make them compulsory on human rights grounds.

Paula Doran – For half of his 30 years Domingos lived chained to a wooden bench behind his village home in the hills of East Timor. His family was so afraid of his unexplained aggression that they bound his wrists and feet with chains.

Jakarta – Indonesian Vice President Megawati Sukarnoputri on Thursday warned President Abdurrahman Wahid that declaring a state of emergency, as he has threatened, would be unconstitutional.

Atambua – Facing the prospect of resettling tens of thousands of East Timorese refugees, an Indonesian government delegation on Thursday appealed to pro-Jakarta militia leaders to return home.

The head of the United Nations Transitional Administration in East Timor (UNTAET) today presented the first State of the Nation address to the East Timorese National Council, giving an in-depth overview of the progress to date and the challenges that lie ahead.

Poso, Central Sulawesi – Eight armed men were detained on Wednesday as they were allegedly about to attack residents working on a cacao plantation in Batugincu village, Poso, Central Sulawesi, an official said.

Jakarta – Hundreds of becak (pedicab) drivers held a march on Wednesday to demand that the poor be given the right to earn a living in the capital.

A group of presumed anti-independence militiamen opened fire Thursday on a patrol of UN peacekeepers in the East Timorese district of Maliana, near the border with Indonesia.

Jayapura – An Irianese separatist group that has taken hostage two Belgian filmmakers is demanding President Abdurrahman Wahid bring the Irian Jaya issues before an international forum, a church official said on Tuesday.

Brendan Pearson – The Prime Minister, Mr John Howard, and Indonesia's President, Mr Abdurrahman Wahid, have pledged to repair a diplomatic relationship marked by discord and bitterness since the East Timor independence vote in 1999.

Nick Everett & Rebecca Meckelburg, Bandung – Police have arrested six members of the radical People's Democratic Party (PRD) in West Java, in an attempt to repress the largest strike the Indonesian province has seen since the coming to power of Suharto in 1965-66.

A group of unidentified youths set fire Wednesday to a school in the East Timorese city of Baucau, 130 kms east of Dili, causing serious material damage. No one was hurt in the incident. UN civil police investigators said the group of between five and 10 people had set fire to the building at about 2:30 a.m. local time.

Joanna Jolly – East Timorese independence leader Xanana Gusmao said he supports pardons for militiamen who are found guilty of committing atrocities during the territory's 1999 vote for independence.

Tomi Soetjipto, Jakarta – Indonesian Vice-President Megawati Sukarnoputri's expected rise to power is likely to be clouded by the same opportunistic politicking that has plagued her hapless boss.

Sixteen political parties have nominated candidates to run in the August elections for East Timor's Constituent Assembly, meeting the deadline set for noon local time on Wednesday, UNTAET, the United Nations Transitional Administration in the territory, said today.

A leading Timorese aid worker has branded as a "sham" an Indonesian canvassing drive which found that 98% of East Timorese refugees confined to camps in West Timor did not want to go home.