Damar Harsanto, Jakarta – Extortion and blackmail are commonplace in the police here against a backdrop of poor law enforcement and flourishing corruption, an independent police watchdo

Fitrian A. and Israr Ardiansyah, Jakarta – Indonesian forests constitute one of the world's megacenters of biological diversity.

Jakarta – The annual choking haze has reached alert levels on mainland Riau, including the provincial capital of Pekanbaru, with authorities warning residents to stay indoors as much as

Matthew Moore, Jakarta – "Because I'm brown, that's why I want to be white." Westerners might still like the bronzed look, but in Indonesia women such as Yusniar are demanding soaps and

Jakarta – The sale of counterfeit medicines not only threatens consumers but also the pharmaceutical industry as the distribution of such drugs is now out of control.

Deborah Snow – Misconduct allegations against Australian troops during their 1999 deployment to East Timor included a claim of "unnecessary amputation" of a suspected militia member's a

Deborah Snow – "The downer was having to pick up two corpses (very smelly) We placed them inside our Land Rover Discovery and it was putrid ...

Major-General Adam Damiri was commander of the Bali-based military area, which included East Timor.

Matthew Moore, Jakarta and agencies – Indonesian politicians and military commanders were last night struggling to contain damaging fallout after soldiers in Aceh attacked two German to

Maire Leadbeater – A cartoon is circulating among human rights networks shows a finger-wagging Indonesian President Megawati exhorting one of her generals to "make sure you win their he

Berni K.

Jakarta – British attempts to convince the Indonesian Air Force to abandon its use of the HS-Hawk warplane in the war in Aceh have been shot down in flames.

Geneva – East Timor, which became the newest nation on the planet in 2002, has joined the Geneva Conventions on human rights in time of war, Red Cross officials said Friday.

Telly Nathalia, Jakarta – An Indonesian prosecutor yesterday demanded a court acquit a top general on trial over violence in East Timor in 1999, saying it had not been proved that he wa

Natasha Bita, Florence and John Kerin – Starving East Timorese may be forced to eat rats, cats and dogs unless they receive food aid within six months, the UN warned in its first report

Nethy Dharma Somba, Jayapura – The Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) has noted that as of Thursday, as many as 16 civilians have been killed or have died

Jakarta – All charges against a general accused of crimes against humanity in East Timor in 1999 were unexpectedly withdrawn yesterday.

Sari P.

Dili – Foreign donors have confirmed their support for the struggling new nation of East Timor, a World Bank spokesman said at the end of a semi-annual meeting here.

International environmental organisation Greenpeace says Indonesia has the world's highest rate of forest loss and may see much of its lowland forest disappear by 2010.

Moch. N.

Jakarta – Some 5,000 people from the group, "Society Concerned with National Education" staged a rally in front of the House of Representatives here on Thursday, rejecting a House plan

Wayne Arnold (New York Times) – Between separatist rebellions, corrupt courts, slumping tourism and rising youth unemployment, Indonesia has plenty to worry about.

Fabiola Desy Unidjaja and A'an Suryana, Jakarta – A visiting British minister warned on Wednesday that the use of HS-Hawk warplanes in the current military offensive against rebels in A

Jakarta – Sony Electronics Indonesia Ltd has ended its Indonesian operations and is offering severance pay to its 884 workers.

Telly Nathalia, Jakarta – An Indonesian prosecutor demanded on Thursday a court acquit the top general on trial over violence in East Timor in 1999, saying he had not been proven guilty

Jakarta – Still smarting from the loss of Sipadan and Ligitan islands, the government plans to resettle people from densely populated areas to 88 uninhabited islands on borders with nei

Fitri Wulandari, Jakarta – State-owned electricity company PT PLN said that power reserves on Java and Bali had been depleted, but stopped short of saying there could be more blackouts

Bill Guerin, Jakarta – Countrywide risk factors, legal risk, a weak banking sector and weak capital markets, community violence and the like, affect sentiment over doing business in Ind

Damar Harsanto, Jakarta – For many Jakartans, being choked by highly polluted air while sitting in a seemingly endless traffic jam is daily occurrence and irritant.

The pathetic performance of Jakarta's special human rights court dealing with atrocities perpetrated by the military and its militia proxies in East Timor in 1999 will no doubt inspire

Indonesia's Golkar Party which was used by former President Suharto to impose decades of authoritarian rule, is undergoing a makeover.

Tertiani ZB Simanjuntak, Jakarta – Following an attack on the office of the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) by the Pemuda Panca Marga (PPM) group last w

Pip Hinman – Since Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri declared martial law in Aceh on May 19, defence minister Robert Hill and foreign affairs minister Alexander Downer have bee

Fabiola Desy Unidjaja, Jakarta – The British government has questioned the use of HS-Hawk warplanes by Indonesia during the military operation against rebels in Aceh, saying the pre-pur

Relations between Indonesia and Sweden sink to a new low, over the fate of Aceh's rebel leaders.

Something is not quite right with this picture: Key Cabinet ministers arriving in their chauffeur-driven Volvo sedans to a Cabinet meeting on Monday to consider which direction to take

Dili – East Timor President Xanana Gusmao said Wednesday his government would implement a plan that would make the impoverished nation agriculturally self-sufficient in five years.

Jakarta – Governor Sutiyoso told Muslim preachers on Tuesday not to use mosques as a forum to rally people against the military operation now taking place in Aceh province.

Nick Everett, Jakarta – On May 19-21, more than 60 peace activists from 26 countries met at Hotel Wisata to assess the challenges faced by the global peace movement and to develop a pla

John Roberts – Despite attempts by the Indonesian government to block information on the military's activities, it is becoming clear that the offensive by the Indonesian armed forces (T

Two-thirds of East Timorese asylum seekers living in Darwin have been told they can stay in Australia, subject to further checks.

Pip Hinman, Sydney – Lesley McCulloch, who spent five months in an Acehnese prison last year, said the current level of repression against ordinary Acehnese by the Indonesian military a

Robert Go, Jakarta – Tourist arrivals in Bali have recovered only to a third of the level that tourism experts had said it would.

Anna Peltola, Stockholm – Rebels in Indonesia's easternmost province of Papua hope the separatist war in distant Aceh will bring their demands into the international limelight, a spokes

Rachel Watts, Dili – As official celebrations took place in Dili on May 20 to mark the first anniversary of East Timor's independence, more than 120 demonstrators gathered outside the g

Matthew Moore, Jakarta – Average incomes across Bali are down 40 per cent, one in five Balinese is out of work, and children are increasingly dropping out of school, according to the fi

Jakarta – On June 3 a number of press and non-government organisations from the Coalition for Violence Against Journalists (Koalisi Antikekerasan terhadap Wartawan) declared their conce

Washington (Agencies) – The following is a summary of results for Indonesia from the 2003 Global Attitudes Survey by the Washington-based Pew Research Center for the People and the Pres

Dili – The creation of jobs to invigorate East Timor's feeble economy is the Dili government's main objective, Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri said Wednesday at the opening of an internati