Mark Baker, Sarah Crichton, Mark Riley and agencies – The suspect who has allegedly admitted taking part in the Bali bombings has told police he wanted to kill as many Americans as possible and "wasn't happy" that Australians died.

John Roberts – An article published in the Washington Post last weekend reported evidence that the highest levels of the Indonesian armed forces (TNI), including TNI chief General Endriartono Sutarto, were involved in the August 31 ambush of employees of the Freeport McMoRan Inc mine in the province of Papua.

Serang, Banten – The Muhammadiyah Students Association (IMM), a student wing of the Muhammadiyah Muslim organization, during its 16th national congress from November 4-6, will confer the "Terrorism Award" to the United States, its chairman Piet Hizbullah Haidir disclosed here on Thursday.

Don Greenlees, Jakarta – Indonesian armed forces commander General Endriartono Sutarto has sent a special team to Papua to investigate allegations that the military were involved in the murders of three employees of the Freeport copper and gold mine, including two Americans.

Robert Go, Jakarta – A radical group, infamous for using Islamic teachings to justify threats against Westerners and attacks on nightclubs and bars, has announced that it is suspending its activities.

This is seen as yet another sign that radical Islam followers could be losing ground support.

Central Java Governor Mardiyanto has asked former members of the recently disbanded radical Islamic group Laskar Jihad to help the province cope with natural disasters and major accidents.

Kupang – The people of the western half of Timor Island, East Nusa Tenggara, must also enjoy their traditional rights as owners of the Timor Sea, the site of oil and gas explorations known as the Timor Gap, and not merely receiving the impacts of damage of the ecosystem in the Timor Sea.

Jakarta – The government has agreed to hold a special repatriation program for East Timorese refugees who want to go home late this year, Antara reported.

East Nusa Tenggara Governor Piet A. Tallo said on Friday that the decision was conveyed by Coordinating Minister for People's Welfare Yusuf Kalla in a letter sent to a group tasked to handle the refugees.

Jakarta – The leader of a worker union at the Pondok Indah hospital in South Jakarta went on trial Wednesday for allegedly torturing his supervisor two months ago.

Prosecutor Hari Wahyudi told the South Jakarta District Court that defendant Edi Waluyo attempted to choke Nugroho Marwanto after the hospital management reprimanded him for neglecting patients.

Yuliansyah, Banjarmasin – Some 463 workers at Pelaihari Sugar Company in Tanah Laut regency, South Kalimantan, have lost their jobs without compensation after their once reputable firm was liquidated by the Office of the State Minister of State Enterprises last month.

The workers have been out of work for three months since the company ceased operations.

Robert Go, Tabanan (Bali) – Some of Indonesia's top businessmen are thumbing their noses at the nation's latest bid to collect outstanding debts worth more than US$13 billion, leaving officials frustrated over their blatant attempt to use the legal system to their advantage.

David Costello – Should Australia conduct joint exercises and training with Indonesia's special forces to boost the fight against terrorism and the hunt for the Bali bombers? The question has become a political football in Canberra and Washington.

Tom Fawthrop – The highly politicized Indonesian military, trained in waging terror during more than 30 years of General Suharto's dictatorship, are among the suspects in last month's Bali bombing, according to a respected Indonesian commentator.

A former militia chief has denied he had committed human rights abuses in East Timor three years ago and said he was a victim of the Indonesian government's desire to appease international criticism.

Dean Yates, Jakarta – Investigators in East Timor have issued an indictment against two Indonesian military officers over the 1999 killing of a Dutch journalist around the time the territory voted to break from Jakarta's harsh rule.

Matthew Moore, Mark Riley and Mark Baker – The Indonesian President, Megawati Soekarnoputri, has cautioned Australia not to overreact to the terrorism threat and not to harass Indonesian nationals, as the increasingly brittle relationship between the countries became further strained.

The Australian Government is continuing to discuss the prospect of renewing military links with Indonesia's notorious Special Forces, Kopassus.

The Defence Minister, Robert Hill has previously said Australia might work with Kopassus to fight terrorism in the region.

The Indonesian military is reported to be engaged in its biggest operation for five months as light tanks and armored personnel carriers pounded a base of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM).

Troops were using light tanks and armored personnel carriers against a suspected concentration of GAM rebels in an area 35 kilometers south of the industrial township of Lhokseumawe.

Jakarta – As many as 20 military officers went on trial Wednesday for allegedly involvement in the deadly attack at the Langkat police station and the Binjai Mobile Brigade headquarters in September.

Dan Murphy, Jakarta – Investigators on three continents are moving closer to definitively tying Al Qaeda and its Indonesian allies to the October 12 bomb blast at the Sari Club on the island of Bali that killed at least 190 people.

Vice president Hamzah Haz said that he was not sure of the involvement of international terrorist groups or the al-Qaeda network in last month's bombings in Bali, El Shinta radio station reported.

Hamzah's remarks were quoted by the head of the Indonesian Islamic Student (PII), Zulfikar, following a meeting at the Vice Presidential palace.

Kurniawan Hari, Jakarta – The latest draft of the broadcasting law, to be deliberated in the next two weeks, reveals the ignorance of the House of Representatives and the government in regards public demands for revision of several contentious articles.

Dili – The leadership of East Timor's ruling Fretilin party met Thursday with its deputies in the Dili parliament to discuss recent revelations of high absenteeism among Fretilin MPs and threats by the party's chiefs to expel "rogue" members.

Iggy Kim – On October 24, a debate was held in Britain's House of Commons over the Foreign Office's handling of the detention of Lesley McCulloch in Indonesia. The debate was initiated by Alan Reid, the Scottish Liberal Democrats member for Argyll and Bute, where McCulloch's parents live. McCulloch is a British citizen and resident of Australia.

East Timor's first Portuguese-language newspaper in more than a quarter century will be formally launched in Dili Thursday.

Dili – Defense force recruits attacked traffic police in the East Timorese capital Friday, in an apparent act of revenge, injuring at least two officers.

Jakarta – Two Indonesian soldiers were among seven people indicted Wednesday in East Timor for killing a Dutch journalist and 19 others during the country's independence struggle in 1999, the UN said in a statement.

Roger Maynard, Sydney – The claim that Australia's spy agency passed on intelligence reports to the United States which implicate the Indonesian military in the West Papua mine ambush could add tension to the already uneasy relationship between Canberra and Jakarta.

The Federal Opposition is backing away from a Government proposal for Australia to resume military ties with elite Kopassus units from the Indonesian Army.

The move has been proposed by Defence Minister Robert Hill, as part of the response to the Bali bombings.

[Indonesian police say they have made significant progress in the hunt for the perpetrators of the Bali bombings. They say they've arrested the owner of a minivan which they believe was used in the car-bomb attack last month. But again, questions are again being raised about the efficiency of the Indonesian police in pursuing the investigation.]

Hundreds of demonstrators marched on the Australian embassy in Jakarta yesterday, angry over Australia's raids on Indonesians suspected of having links to the terrorist group Jemaah Islamiah.

Protesters blocked the entrance to the embassy, waving banners including "Indonesia under attack" and "Go to hell".

Max Lane, Jakarta – The "war on terror" propaganda campaign being conducted by the Australian and US governments is providing ammunition for xenophobic right-wing political forces in Indonesia.

The number of people with Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) and Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) has increased drastically by 340 percent to 359 in June, 2002 from 51 in 1999 due to the approach used to handle HIV/AIDS cases, according to a local foundation.

Jill Jolliffe, Atambua – East Timor's President Xanana Gusmao has called on the United Nations to lower its security rating for West Timor, which is now at a higher stage of alert than Afghanistan or Bali.

Dili – An average of 12 percent of lawmakers do not attend sittings of East Timor's parliament and only one in ten of these absentees offers a valid excuse for their non-appearance, a report commissioned by the Dili parliament reveals.

[New evidence has emerged that the Indonesian army was directly involved in the ambush that killed two Americans and an Indonesian near the Freeport Gold mine in the Indonesian province of Papua last August. Suspicion for the attack initially fell on the Free Papua Movement.

Tertiani ZB Simanjuntak, Jakarta – Thousands of workers from eight textile and textile-products factories in Greater Jakarta have been left without jobs and payment after their foreign employers abruptly stopped operations and fled the country in the first half of this year.

Ahmad Junaidi, Jakarta – Labor unions demanded City Governor Sutiyoso on Monday to review its decree on the 2003 provincial minimum wage which rules an increase of 7 percent from the current Rp 590,000 to Rp 631,000 per month.

Nani Farida, Banda Aceh – The mystery behind the Free Aceh Movement (GAM)'s decision to delay signing a peace agreement with the government was partly explained by a respected Acehnese Muslim leader over the weekend.

Jill Jolliffe, Kupang – President Jose "Xanana" Gusmao has led a delegation of more than 100 East Timorese, including parliamentarians, cabinet ministers, a football team and 16 entertainers, to West Timor in a new bid to empty refugee camps there.

Dili – International donations were used to plug East Timor's USD 22 million budget deficit in the financial year 2001-2002, although the world's newest nation's state receipts were higher than anticipated in this period.

Catherine Porter – John Rumbiak has a theory about the recent bombing in his native Indonesia. It wasn't the work of Muslim extremists in cahoots with the Al Qaeda terrorist network, the human-rights activist says.

Ellen Nakashima and Alan Sipress, Jakarta – Senior Indonesian military officials discussed an operation against Freeport McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc. before an ambush near its mine in Papua province that killed two Americans and one Indonesian on August 31, according to intelligence obtained by the United States, a US government official and other sources said.

Paul Tait, Sydney – At least three Papuan men fired about 200 rounds from rifles and shotguns into a convoy of mainly US teachers, killing three, near a huge gold mine in Indonesia's Papua two months ago, ambush victims said on Sunday.

Leonard C. Sebastian – The Indonesian government has responded to the Bali bombing by issuing two anti-terrorism regulations generally modelled on Canada's anti-terrorism legislation Bill C-36.

Jill Jolliffe, Lacluta – In the remote south coast town of Lacluta, nine villagers accused of violence against their neighbours during 1999 militia attacks have faced their victims in the presence of the community.

Kupang – East Timorese president Xanana Gusmao told a sports stadium filled with East Timorese refugees Saturday that it was their decision whether or not to return home.

But Gusmao told the crowd of about 1,000 people that his country will welcome those who come back.

Bill Guerin – The financial crisis of 1997 brought Indonesia's previously spectacular economic growth to an abrupt halt. Going through the ensuing rigors of massive political change, economic reform and decentralization has left the country ill-equipped to face the very latest challenges of encouraging new inward investment.

On August 31, 2002, unidentified assailants opened fire on an International School bus carrying innocent civilians. American nationals Ted Burcon and Ricky Spear and Indonesian national F.X. Bambang Riwanto were killed.

Hamish McDonald and Matthew Moore – Early this week, a military attache with a Western embassy in Jakarta was given a tip-off by senior officers in Indonesian armed forces headquarters: the head of the counter-terrorism unit with the Indonesian army's special forces had been identified as a source of the explosives used in the October 12 bombings in Bali.