Jakarta – Indonesian police and soldiers set fire to dozens of houses and shops on Friday in the troubled Aceh province to avenge the killing of a soldier, a report said.
A soldier was found dead in the Lammeu area of Pidie district on Friday morning, prompting security authorities to send troops to the area to search for the assailants, the Detik online news service said.
Michael Richardson, Dili – Now that the East Timorese independence coalition no longer has a common enemy to hold it together, there are signs that it is starting to fracture.
Lindsay Murdoch – Eurico Guterres looks a beaten man. Gone are his thug bodyguards and the copy-cat red beret uniform of Indonesia's elite Kopassus forces. Gone also are his bravado and threats to kill.
Instead, the militia leader – who ordered mass murders and the destruction of East Timor – is living under an assumed name in a seedy hotel in north Jakarta.
Jakarta – Dozens of policemen in Central Java were injured in two days of protests by villagers trying to attack a rubber plantation, the official Antara news agency said Thursday.
Two police trucks were set ablaze on Wednesday along with a police post and a telecommunication center at the Ciseru-Cipari plantation in Cilacap, about 270 kilometers southeast of the capital.
Reuters in Jakarta – Indonesia's parliament on Thursday backed away from the idea of allowing any referendum for the troubled province of Aceh.
Separatists are demanding a referendum on independence for the Sumatran region and a special parliamentary committee earlier recommended holding a vote of some kind in the province.
Vaudine England, Jakarta – The armed forces are smarting under a welter of rights abuse allegations. They have warned that local and international efforts to call the generals to account will not only fail but could threaten the nation's state of relative calm.
Daniel Cooney, Jakarta – State investigators demanded yesterday that army generals be tried for human rights abuses in East Timor after President Abdurrahman Wahid said he would not block their prosecutions by the Indonesian courts.
Paul Daley, Canberra – Continued European bans on arms sales will seriously hamper Indonesia's "internal repression" but could prompt Jakarta to forge new military relationships with China and Russia, a top-secret Australian intelligence paper reveals.
Dan Murphy, Jakarta – Indonesia's economy is finally showing signs of life thanks to a peaceful presidential election, a new president who has proved acceptable to the majority of the Indonesian people, and black gold.
Asip Agus Hasani, Yogyakarta – One manifestation of the military's dwi fungsi or dual function are its territorial institutions which span from provincial to village level: Military regional commands (Kodam), military resort commands and district commands at the regional level (Kodim), district level commands (Koramil) and village guidance bodies (Babinsa), comprising noncommissione
Dili – A commander of one of East Timor's anti-independence militias has admitted he was behind one of the territory's most horrific massacres and claims he was acting on the orders of Indonesian special forces.
David Nason – The Australian consortium behind the failed Dili Lodge hotel venture in East Timor hoped to reap an annual profit of nearly $7 million, while initially operating tax-free and paying wages of less than 60c an hour for local staff.
Jakarta – East Timorese militia supremo Joao da Silva Tavares has officially disbanded an umbrella organization for pro-Indonesian militias ordering them to hand over all arms, a report said here Tuesday.
Associated Press, Banda Aceh – Violence again marred the fasting month of Ramadhan in Aceh as three students and four police personnel were severely injured in separate incidents in Jeumpa Aceh regency over the weekend.
Brian Toohey – Not so long ago, Major General Zacky Anwar Makarim had good reason to smile when he saw a member of the Australian embassy enter his Jakarta headquarters. He could be fairly confident the visitor was bearing gifts. Anwar had little to offer in return, but this did not diminish the Australians' determination to prove they were generous allies.
Joanne Collins, Kupang – Pro-Jakarta militiamen armed with pistols and clubs threatened UN aid officials in Indonesian West Timor on Friday, preventing them from entering camps for East Timorese refugees.
Hamish Mcdonald, Dili – The Australian commander of the United Nations peacekeeping force in East Timor has appealed for the international community to continue to pressure Indonesia to allow the remaining 100,000 displaced people in West Timor to return home.
Dili – UN police in East Timor have been overwhelmed by the number of murder cases they must investigate with limited resources after the wave of violence that swept this territory after its August 30 vote for independence.
Kafil Yamin, Jakarta – Surya Sunjaya, who has been in the "entertainment business" for 23 years and is suspected to run a drug operation as well, is not afraid of police operations. He can face any bust by the police force, he says, because he knows he can "make a deal" with them.
Yasmin Ghahremani and Tom Mccawley, Bandung – The prosperous, tree-lined streets of Bandung hearken back to an era earlier this century when the city was known as the Paris of Java.
Dan Murphy, Jakarta – Indonesia's new government is facing a dilemma as restive provinces such as Aceh, Irian Jaya and Riau clamour for a bigger share of the revenues from their natural resources, such as oil and gas.
Jakarta – The government and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) are still at odds over the questions of when and how much to increase the price of fuel and electricity.
Dili – Eighteen East Timorese freed by Jakarta under a presidential amnesty program arrived in their homeland Saturday to an emotional welcome.
Michael Ware. Dili – East Timor's political heavyweights and leading lights, now is crunchtime. Real positions of influence and power are up for grabs, and the manoeuvring is under way.
Jakarta – Indonesia on Friday released 90 political prisoners, most of them East Timorese.
In a ceremony at Cipinang jail in East Jakarta, where many of of those released were held, Law and Legislation Minister Yusril Isra Mahendra officially freed them by reading out three presidential decrees containing the names.
Tim Healy and Tom Mccawley, Jakarta – He must have known it couldn't last. Abdurrahman Wahid has been metaphorically bobbing and weaving through his first weeks as Indonesia's President. Consider the moves: filling his cabinet with a hodge-podge of politically motivated appointees, novices and academics. Promising Aceh a referendum. Pledging national stability.
Jakarta – Indonesia's military Friday warned they were ready to crush separatists in the troubled province of Aceh if ordered to, following the gunning down of a soldier and kidnapping of two officers in the strife-torn territory.
Jakarta – A government-sanctioned inquiry said on Wednesday that Gen. Wiranto could be charged with "omission" for allowing violence and destruction to continue in the ravaged territory of East Timor after the August 30 self-determination ballot.
Jakarta – After two years of antigovernment riots and economic turmoil, Indonesia's technology gurus thought it best to keep the public in the dark about possible widespread failures from the Y2K computer bug.
Tjipta Lesmanaa, Jakarta – The current picture of Indonesian workers is not that encouraging. Of the 90 million-strong workforce Indonesia currently has, roughly 60 million are engaged in the formal sector as well as in the informal sector. Forty million of them earn only Rp 150,000 to Rp 200,000 per month, far below the poverty line set by the National Statistics Bureau.
Jakarta – Foreign minister Alwi Shihab said on Tuesday Indonesia would not allow its generals to be tried overseas.
Responding to concerns from legislators that top military officers may be subject to international humiliation and trial abroad, Alwi said the government was doing its utmost to see that it would not happen.
Sonny Inbaraj, Darwin – Australia's national broadcaster and a magazine have come under investigation by the country's spy agency for airing and publishing a series of highly-embarrassing stories based on alleged intelligence leaks on East Timor.
Jakarta – At least 3,400 stray dogs have been killed this year in the Indonesian province of East Kalimantan in a drive by the authorities to prevent the spread of rabies, the official Antara news agency said Thursday.
Munif Muchsinin, the head of the province's animal husbandry service, said the drive had been successful.
Novan Iman Santosa, Karawang – Like many AIDS volunteers around the globe, Abdurrachman Saibun, 25, is busy at the end of the year preparing to commemorate World AIDS Day, which falls on December 1.
Ted Bardacke and Diarmid O'Sullivan – "We reiterate our full respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Indonesia and support the efforts of President Wahid toward a peaceful settlement of the situation in Aceh."
Jakarta – Military police chief Maj. Gen. Djasri Marin said here on Wednesday that 11 military personnel and two civilians had been declared suspects in the killing of at least 65 people, including Islamic boarding school teacher Tengku Bantaqiah, in the troubled province of Aceh in July.
Dili, Tim Johnson – Timorese Tuesday celebrated East Timor's first free anniversary of Indonesia's invasion of the former Portuguese colony on December 7, 1975.
Veteran independence campaigner Jose Ramos-Horta told Kyodo News his people's hearts are filled with sorrow for the many who died during the initial assault on Dili.
Nora Boustany, East Timor – An American relief worker who arrived Sunday from East Timor described horrific conditions in resettlement camps she visited across the border in western Timor, where she said she saw mass graves of children, and refugees living as the virtual hostages of Indonesian soldiers and local militias.
Indonesia's rice market is nervously waiting for the government's final decision on an import tariff while players' reluctance to sell their stocks has triggered price hikes, traders said yesterday.
Jakarta – Leaked military documents obtained by Indonesia's leading independent human rights group Wednesday showed civil rights abuses over the past nine years in Aceh province were carried out on the instructions of the army in Jakarta.
Jakarta – Indonesia will slow down foreign borrowings and focus more on the domestic bond market to fund government projects, Finance Minister Bambang Sudibyo said Wednesday.
Increasing reliance on domestic financing would improve the country's balance of payment position, Bambang said at a hearing of the parliament's budget committee.
Linda Kaucher – Indonesian military forces shot protesters trying to prevent them lowering the West Papuan independence flag in the south coast town of Timika on December 1. Approximately 30 people were injured by the gunfire, and at least 10 people were arrested.
The Victorian branch of the ALP has voted against a proposal to provide the National Council of Timorese Resistance (CNRT) with $5000 for urgent reconstruction work in East Timor.
Jon Land – As investigations by both the United Nations and the Indonesian Human Rights Commission continue into the Indonesian military's involvement in the killing and destruction which took place in East Timor, the Howard government remains reluctant to divulge vital intelligence that would aid these investigations.
Vaudine England – The Indonesian Government, eager to prove its reformist credentials, said yesterday it had reopened the investigation into alleged corruption by Suharto, but prospects of retrieving his money or seeing the ailing former president in the dock remain unclear.
James Balowski, Jakarta – Spending a day at the People's Democratic Party (PRD) headquarters in East Jakarta watching the stream of activists coming and going, it's easy to forget that just three years ago, the party was banned, its key leaders jailed and the remainder hunted by the military and forced underground.
Jakarta – A mob of angry Jakarta residents on Wednesday set ablaze four cars and a gambling den in Jakarta's Chinatown on the eve of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, witnesses said.
An AFP photographer said a building believed to be a gambling den was on fire when she arrived at the scene. Police were quick to move in and bring the crowd under control.
Max Lane – Action in Solidarity with Indonesia and East Timor member Chris Latham was arrested in Jakarta on November 29. Latham, who is a student in Sydney, was participating in a demonstration of workers and students organised by the Indonesian National Front for Labour Struggles.
Ambon – Calm returned to the riot-torn province on Monday following two consecutive days of communal clashes which claimed at least 31 lives. Businesses and schools reopened in Ambon as roadblocks were cleared.
The situation in nearby Seram Island was also calm on Monday after the authorities secured the area, according to Maluku Police spokesman Maj. Phillipus Jakriel.
Tim Dodd, Banda Aceh – The two men and two women who were paraded through Aceh's capital of Banda Aceh wore signs saying "I stole and I deserve punishment" and "I deeply repent".