Jakarta – The Gramedia bookstore here has withdrawn from its shelves all books related to communism, socialism, Marxism and Leninism including the best-seller, Palu Arit (Hammer and Sickle).
Sales supervisor of Lampungs Gramedia, Rachni Wibowo, disclosed yesterday in Bandar Lampung that at least 10 titles of such books have been removed from the store and disposed of.
Pip Hinman – The International Monetary Fund is tightening the screws on President Abdurrahman Wahid to deliver on austerity measures in return for its US$5 billion bailout package.
The labor sector must be allowed to participate in the political process because they too have rights, said the Secretary-General of the Socialist Party of Timor Avelino Coelho.
Vanya Tanaja, Dili – Thousands of small traders at the Dili market (Mercado Lama) are being pressured to move to two refurbished markets in Comoro and Becora, on the western and eastern outskirts of the city respectively.
Jon Land – In the wake of the second round of negotiations between Australia and East Timor on the Timor Gap Treaty and the disputed seabed boundary, Australia's big business press are stepping-up its support for Canberra's push to deny East Timor a fair share of the revenue from oil and gas deposits.
Jakarta – An increasing number of Indonesian migrant workers find themselves in grim circumstances these days due to unjust salary reductions, along with the threat of rape, repatriation, torture or even death sentence.
Jakarta – Labor rallies held in several major cities to commemorate World Labor Day were predominantly marred by vandalism and clashes between workers and police. Labor figures claimed that the government and parliament have never given enough attention to the problems of laborers.
Jakarta – A list of the declared wealth of 77 officials and legislators issued by the State Officials' Wealth Audit Commission (KPKPN) here on Tuesday revealed House of Representatives speaker Akbar Tandjung to be 33 times richer than People's Consultative Assembly speaker Amien Rais. Amien claims to only possess total assets worth Rp 1 billion (US$90,000).
Jakarta – Police shot four people and detained another seven following a riot that broke out in Manokwari, Irian Jaya, Monday afternoon.
Jakarta – Indonesian workers took the opportunity of Labor Day on Tuesday to hold rallies and voice their demand for better pay and working conditions.
John Haseman, Bangkok – Indonesia is resuming extensive military operations in the troubled province of Aceh after almost a year of fruitless political negotiations, humanitarian pauses and ceasefires which the government fears have considerably strengthened the separatist Aceh Merdeka guerrilla force (GAM).
Max Lane – Between 100,000 to 500,000 supporters of President Abdurrahman Wahid are expected to gather in Jakarta for a mass prayer meeting on April 29, just one day before the Indonesian house of representatives meets to discuss a censure motion against the president over corruption allegations.
Manado, North Sulawesi – Environmentalists said here over the weekend that the submarine tailing disposal (STD) used as a waste disposal system by gold mining firm PT Newmont Raya Minahasa (NRM) was unsafe for the environment as it had affected the sea habitat and human beings.
Djoko Tjiptono/HD, Jakarta – Around on thousand of Indonesia workers from greater Jakarta marched to flood at the Monas National Monument square in a rally to commemorate International Workers Day on Tuesday.
Shoeb Kagda, Jakarta – Indonesia's Parliament yesterday issued a second censure against embattled President Abdurrahman Wahid, raising the political temperature to a new high, but the besieged leader's political career may not be over just yet.
Marianne Kearney, Jakarta – As Vice-President Megawati Sukarnoputri's legislators lobbed their strongest shot yet against President Abdurrahman Wahid, acting as shock troops in the attack on him, party members alike claim the attack was an attempt to persuade him that the game was up and resignation was his only sensible choice.
Jakarta – Thousands of people braved heavy rain on Monday as they marched through the city's thoroughfares in a display of support for President Abdurrahman "Gus Dur" Wahid, whose political legitimacy slid to a further low after the House of Representatives issued him a second censure.
Mark Dodd, Dili – The United Nations' Serious Crimes Unit, the taskforce gathering evidence to prosecute perpetrators of the violence that swept East Timor in 1999, is on the point of collapse. Morale is at rock bottom and qualified investigators are quitting amid claims that the unit is under-equipped and badly managed.
Lindsay Murdoch, Jakarta – The notorious East Timorese militia leader Eurico Guterres will be free within weeks after a Jakarta court yesterday sentenced him to six months' jail for inciting violence. The court said the four months he had spent under house arrest in Jakarta while awaiting the outcome of his trial should be deducted from the sentence.
Craig Skehan – The Australian Government yesterday urged Indonesia to push ahead with the prosecution of all those involved in killings and other human rights violations in East Timor in the months leading up to and after the 1999 referendum on independence.
Seth Mydans, Jakarta – April 30 – Legislators today overwhelmingly censured President Abdurrahman Wahid for corruption and incompetence, setting the stage for possible impeachment of the nation's first democratically elected leader in four decades.
Lindsay Murdoch, Jakarta – As Abdurrahman Wahid prepares to face a second parliamentary censure of his presidency on Monday, concern is growing in Jakarta that Indonesia's economic recovery is in peril.
Marianne Kearney, Jakarta – Several Muslim groups, such as the militant Laskar Jihad and the extremist Muslim Brotherhood, have threatened to take to the streets on Monday and have a face-off with President Abdurrahman Wahid's suicide squads, providing just the catalyst for an explosive confrontation among the masses.
Achmad Sukarsono, Jakarta – Embattled President Abdurrahman Wahid, staring down the barrel of impeachment, has asked Indonesia for forgiveness but said no leader could pull the nation out of its current economic mess.
Lukmanul Hakim/Hendra & HY Detik, Jakarta – The shooting of Tempo weekly magazine journalist, Rudi P. Singgih has been condemned by the Indonesian Legal Aid and Human Rights Association (PBHI).
Hamish McDonald – A secret report for the Indonesian Government makes it clear that its military directed the militia violence against East Timor's independence vote and that top generals approved of some of the worst atrocities.
[The Timor massacres were planned in detail: the guns, the trucks, the burial sites. Hamish McDonald has Jakarta's secret report which details the callous and calculating part played by senior Indonesian army and police officers.]
Bagus Kurniawan/Hendra & HY, Jakarta – Around 60 students under the Student and Youth Alliances of Yogyakarta (APMY) staged a demonstration at the Gadjah Mada University (UGM) Roundabout. They demanded the disbandment of Golkar party and the revocation of the dual function of the Indonesian Military.
Devi Asmarani, Atambua – Weapons are valued treasures in this border town that has 63,000 East Timorese refugees, and there is always an interested buyer – the Indonesian military.
The reluctant sellers are former pro-Jakarta militiamen, who have been using their guns to intimidate fellow East Timorese from returning home and to make a living by robbing locals.
Lindsay Murdoch, Jakarta – Key people accused of complicity in the bloodshed in East Timor are set to escape prosecution because of the bungled wording of a decree issued this week by Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid.
Jakarta – All crimes committed in East Timor in 1999 and investigated by Indonesia's Human Rights Commission (Komnas Ham) will be tried here soon, a spokesman for the Indonesian Attorney General said Thursday. It will not matter if the acts occurred before or after East Timor's independence ballot, said Mulyoharjo.
Jakarta – Some Indonesian NGOs – including Kontras (Commission for Missing Persons & Victims of Violence), YLBHI (Foundation of the Indonesian Legal Aid Institute), and ELSAM (Institute for Policy Research & Advocacy) – suspect that the Attorney General's Office (AGO) has tried to cover up Wiranto's involvement in violating human rights in East Timor after the 1999 referendu
Marianne Kearney, Jakarta – Mr Abdurrahman Wahid's supporters have one vital weapon up their sleeves – a semi-mystical resistance to bullets, machetes and swords - which is provoking equal measures of fear and scepticism across Indonesia.
Two AID/WATCH volunteers returned from East Timor yesterday and observed that, while East Timorese society has been heartened by the stability and security restored by the Peace Keeping Forces, and by the good relief work supported by the international community, it is distressed and confused by the emerging role of the World Bank.
Following Indonesian President Wahid's decision on 23 April to limit the jurisdiction of a new human rights court for East Timor to crimes committed after the August 1999 popular consultation in the territory, TAPOL is calling once again for the immediate establishment of international tribunal for East Timor.
Jill Jolliffe, Dara Lata – Evidence is mounting against retired Indonesian Lieutenant-General Prabowo Subianto for his alleged role in atrocities in East Timor. General Prabowo, a former commander of the feared Kostrad special forces, is former president Suharto's son-in-law. He served in Indonesia between 1976 and the 1990s.
The East Timorese association of non-governmental organizations NGO Forum said Thursday it was "very worried" about the public stance taken by independence leader Xanana Gusmao minimizing the importance of an eventual international tribunal to try Indonesian atrocities in the territory.
Chris McCall, Dili – They used to supply bombs to Falintil resistance fighters. Now East Timor's Marxists are preparing for battle at the ballot box. In a building once occupied by the feared Aitarak militia, the Timor Socialist Party, or PST, is mapping out its new campaign.
Sadanand Dhume, Yogyakarta, Bandung and Jakarta – At first glance, there's nothing extraordinary about the small religious school outside Yogyakarta in central Java. Its mosque is a modest affair. The scrawny chickens strutting about in the dirt could belong in any Asian village. And the lush green vegetation all around is common on this fertile island.
Devi Asmarani, Jakarta – Jaded residents here are going about their business as usual despite the looming threat of unrest as politicians and their supporters head for a showdown next Monday.
By Susan Sim, Jakarta – Vice-President Megawati Sukarnoputri is not fully convinced that Parliament has sound constitutional reasons to impeach President Abdurrahman Wahid on the basis of the second censure that it is set to slap on him next Monday.
Robert Go, Jakarta – An IMF review team slipped out of Jakarta late Tuesday night without resolving its stalled US$5-billion bailout programme here, signalling the agency's lack of confidence in the government and leaving the economy in a path towards a meltdown.
Robert Go, Jakarta – The Indonesian government appears keen to show that there is little "legal certainty" for foreign investors in the country, even after warnings from international donors that further loans would be tied to, among other things, reform measures for the judiciary.
Jakarta – Up to US$300 million of mining investments in Indonesia are caught in legal limbo because of a new ban on mining in protected forests, said the Indonesian Mining Association (IMA).
Some 120 mining firms own exploration permits in forests which are now protected, and they may have to abandon their investments in these areas, said IMA official Paul Coutrier.
Jakarta – Indonesia received a symbolic boost of confidence from donor countries yesterday, but was told in clear terms that further funds will be tied to definitive progress on several key reform issues.
Sibylle Kaczorek – In a country oppressed for 400 years by colonial Portugal, then brutalised by 24 years of Indonesian military rule, and now suffering from dire poverty, the issues of women have long been considered secondary. But now East Timor's socialists are seeking to tackle women's oppression.
Tanya Vanaja, Dili – East Timor's social and political tensions may boil over into violence during elections scheduled for August, the country's first since it gained freedom from Indonesian military rule in 1999.
Mark Dodd, Dili – About 300 East Timorese supporters of a pro-independence party protested outside the United Nations headquarters in Dili yesterday.
Despite the UN banning weapons in public on Monday, more than 70 supporters dressed in traditional attire and brandished swords. Police did not try to disarm the protesters.
The President of ASDT-Fretilin Francisco Xavier do Amaral said East Timorese from 12 districts were in Dili to deliver their aspirations to UNTAET that the Republic of Democratic Timor Leste was already proclaimed on 28 November 1975.
Vaudine England, Jogyakarta – Hundreds of people are signing up for membership of a new anti-communist front at the head office of the Golkar political party, organisers claim.