Jakarta – A day after disclosing that Jakarta would work with Washington to probe into Al-Qaeda's alleged links here, security czar Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono backtracked in an apparent move to appease Muslim groups.

The Coordinating Minister for Politics and Security denied saying the government had invited the United States to conduct a joint probe on international terror cells here.

"What we meant by cooperating with other countries is not a joint investigation," he said after a meeting with local Muslim leaders here. "We would conduct our own investigation, although we do accept information from other governments." He said as part of the cooperation, Jakarta has sent a team to question alleged Al-Qaeda operative Umar Faruq, who was arrested here in June and detained in the US.

According to Time magazine, Faruq had confessed to a series of bombings here and a plan to assassinate President Megawati Sukarnoputri.

Mr Susilo made the remark after he and several top government officials briefed some 40 Muslim leaders. He apparently wanted to dispel beliefs that the country was kow-towing to the US.

The Straits Times understands that Mr Susilo inadvertently mentioned Jakarta's cooperation with the US during an interview after a briefing for local editors on Monday. "He was not supposed to say these things, but it came out in the course of the interview, so now he had to modify it," a government source told The Straits Times.

Said Muslim cleric Habib Al Habsyi, who attended yesterday's meeting: "If we cooperate with the United States, it is an insult to the intelligence body, police, military and the government."

"That means we are a slave to the West and the Zionists, who have been targeting only Muslims in their hunt for terrorists." Said another cleric, Mr Dadang Hawari: "We told the ministers that we should handle our own problems with terrorism, and that other countries like the US should not apply their own policy here because it may not work."

Muslim scholar Komarudin Hidayat said the government was trapped between international and domestic pressures in the fight against terrorism. "If it shows that it supports the US it will lose popularity, but at the same time it cannot ignore international pressures because of our dependence," he told The Straits Times.

At the briefing, ulamas were told about the alleged bombing masterminds Hambali and Indra Samudra, who have been linked to the Jemaah Islamiyah network, and its alleged spiritual leader Abu Bakar Bashir.

The latter skipped yesterday's meeting to file a complaint against Time magazine for linking him to Faruq.