Batam – Local religious and community leaders are angry with the authorities for turning a blind eye to the thriving gambling dens on the island which cater to a largely Malaysian and Singaporean clientele.

Kurniawan Hari, Jakarta – Women activists demanded the executive board of political parties on Tuesday arrange legislative candidates alternately between men and women to give women a greater chance to meet the 30 percent quota for representation in legislative bodies.

Yuli Trisuwarni, Bandung – The Ka'bah Youth Movement Muslim organization has threatened all movie theaters in the West Java capital of Bandung to stop showing American and British films until the countries stop attacking Iraq.

Apriadi Gunawan, Medan – Twenty-five students began a hunger strike on Monday during a rally in the grounds of the North Sumatra provincial council to demand the permanent closure of pulp and paper mill PT Toba Pulp Lestari (TPL), which they accuse of causing serious pollution.

The Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi) has severed ties with one of its main donors, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), in protest against the US-led war on Iraq.

Indonesia promised to safeguard westerners amid continuing anti-war protests as police said 10 Muslim radicals arrested for allegedly harassing foreigners could face a year in jail.

Bogor – More than 6,100 elementary school students from 30 subdistricts in Bogor regency need financial help because the poor economic condition of their families.

Nurhadiaty, head of the basic education office of the town, said that Bogor also was in need of more than 800 teachers.

Jakarta – Ten members of a radical Islamic group were arrested in Jakarta yesterday after they tried to force their way into a Sizzler restaurant in a thwarted bid to harass foreigners and protest against the US-led war in Iraq.

Jakarta – Some 100 employees of the state-owned mint, Perum Peruri, staged a demonstration on Monday at its office on Jl. Faletehan, Kebayoran Baru, South Jakarta, demanding a salary hike of 100 percent.

Stockholm – Swedish companies pride themselves on their high standards of business ethics, but now corporate heavyweights have come in for stinging criticism for their alleged role in the destruction of Indonesian rainforests.

Jakarta – An Indonesian court on Monday rejected a demand that prosecutors free Muslim cleric Abu Bakar Bashir after lawyers for the alleged head of the militant Jemaah Islamiah group argued his detention was illegal.

Bashir was arrested in October on suspicion of links to church bombings in 2000 and a plot to kill President Megawati Sukarnoputri.

Muninggar Sri Saraswati and Tertiani ZB Simanjutak, Jakarta – The wave of antiwar rallies continued on Sunday with thousands of protesters taking to the streets across the country to express their opposition to the ongoing US-led invasion of Iraq.

M. Taufiqurrahman and Leo Wahyudi S, Jakarta – The society has to count on itself in the war against the hoodlums and their organized mob bosses as the government, which should lead the campaign, reaps benefits from the presence of thugs instead, an activist allege.

Jakarta – Indonesia's Vice President Hamzah Haz has rejected US President George W.Bush's request to close down the Iraqi embassy in Jakarta.

"The [Indonesian] government cannot possibly close the Iraqi embassy," he said commenting on the US president's request to other countries in the world to close down Iraqi embassies.

Haidir Anwar Tanjung, Pekanbaru, Riau – Several major companies in the natural-resource rich province of Riau allegedly pay the local police and Indonesian Military (TN) to ensure the safety of their operations, local figures said, following the disclosure of a similar practice by an American firm in Papua.

A'an Suryana, Jakarta – As the antiwar protests become rowdier, scholars urged the government on Sunday to swiftly move to prevent them turning violent.

Haedar Nashir, the secretary-general of Muhammadiyah, the second largest Muslim organization in the country, called on the government to invite the representatives of the protesters for talks to calm them down.

Police in Indonesia's second-biggest city Surabaya have reacted angrily to an Australian warning that anti-Western groups may be planning a "terrorist" attack there, saying there were no signs of threat.

Devi Asmarani, Jakarta – Indonesia's educators and religious leaders have called on Parliament to drop a new education Bill amid fears its controversial content will threaten private schools' autonomy and encourage religious segregation in the country.

Jakarta – Many police officers in the Indonesian capital are involved in organised crime and provide security to top gangsters, said a former police chief.

Jakarta – An Indonesian singer whose erotic dance style has stirred controversy says she will quit and attend religious classes provided she is given one billion rupiah.

Jakarta – President Megawati Soekarnoputri plans to sue Rakyat Merdeka daily for comparing her to Soemanto, a man who confessed to eating parts of dead human bodies.

Jakarta – Hundreds of Muslims activists forced the closure of an American fast-food franchise in Surabaya, East Java, as nationwide rallies to protest the US-led war in Iraq continued on Friday.

Dean Yates and Jerry Norton, Jakarta – Demonstrators took to the streets on Friday in 10 cities in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim country, to protest against US-led attacks on Iraq as clerics savaged President George Bush in mosque sermons.

Jakarta – Indonesian Military (TNI) chief Gen. Endriartono Sutarto warned anti-war protesters in the country on Thursday to avoid staging anarchic demonstrations.

Both moderate and radical Indonesian Islamic leaders reacted angrily to the start of the US-led war on Iraq as police stepped up security in the world's largest Muslim-populated nation.

Australia's Islamic neighbour Indonesia has fiercely opposed the US-led attack on Iraq calling on the UN to hold an emergency session. President Megawati Sukarnoputri who made the call after a lengthy cabinet meeting in Jakarta, had earlier assured Australian Prime Minister John Howard that she understood a war in Iraq was not a war against Islam.

Robert Go, Jakarta – The growing menace of premans or thugs is taking centre stage as the Indonesian public now vent their frustrations openly after the controversial Tempo magazine harassment case.

Yulianti, Jakarta – Around 200 people from the Anti-Militarism People's Front (Front Rakyat Anti-Militerisme, FRAM) demonstrated in front the presidential palace and the department of defense. They were rejecting all forms of militarism in Indonesia and the world.

John B. Haseman – Indonesia's difficult transition from autocracy to democracy is almost five years old. The huge and disparate country struggles with economic, social and political problems that have proved far more difficult than expected.

Tony Sitathan, Jakarta – This Thursday is a day of reckoning for Iraq, when its 48-hour ultimatum issued by the president of the United States, George W Bush, expires.

The Indonesian Government has signed a new Letter of Intent (LoI) with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), together with a memorandum on eonomic and financial policies (MEFP) to IMF managing director Horst Kohler.

Jerry Norton and Dean Yates, Jakarta – The cabinet of the world's most populous Muslim nation was discussing the US attack on Iraq on Thursday, Indonesia's chief security minister told reporters.

Indonesian Muslim leaders immediately condemned the start of US-led strikes on Iraq, labelling them an attack on humanity and warning of big protests.

About 3,000 Indonesian teachers have flooded the grounds of parliament in protest against a bill on religious teaching in schools.

The teachers shouted and waved placards urging the government to scrap an article in a new bill, which stipulates all students, even in religion-based schools, have the right to receive instruction in their own religion.

James Balowski, Jakarta – In response to continuing protests and press criticism, the government of President Megawati Sukarnoputri is resorting to the tactics used by the Suharto dictatorship to suppress dissent.

An Islamic youth group threatened to force US and allied diplomats to leave Indonesia, the world's largest Muslim-populated nation, amid rising condemnation of the planned war against Iraq.

Anshor, the youth wing of Indonesia's largest Islamic organisation Nahdlatul Ulama, also said it plans a national boycott of US products.

Iggy Kim – Dita Sari, head of the Indonesian National Front for Workers' Struggle, was in Baghdad on March 14-18 as part of high-profile Asian peace mission to Iraq. Mission members visited hospitals, orphanages and schools. They met with a wide range of Iraqi civilians. The mission was an act of solidarity and opposition to the impending war.

Palu – A rally by hundreds of students opposing possible US-led military action in Iraq here on Tuesday ended with them illegally barricading an outlet of the US-based Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) fast-food restaurant chain.

Karl Schoenberger, Jakarta – As the United States braces for a terrorist backlash from war, the Indonesian military is exploiting US concern about Islamist militants in Southeast Asia in its bid to regain the power and political clout forfeited after strongman Suharto was deposed five years ago.

Sri Wahyuni, Yogyakarta – Anticorruption activists urged the prosecutors' office here on Tuesday to investigate provincial councillors and officials connected to a bribery case that led to councillor Herman Abdurrachman's two-year jail sentence.

Jakarta – National Police chief Gen. Da'i Bachtiar said on Tuesday that the police had accepted a gift of a car from businessman Tomy Winata, whose supporters are accused of assaulting three journalists of Tempo news magazine.

Suherdjoko and Apriadi Gunawan, Medan/Semarang – Hundreds of journalists staged a demonstration in Semarang, the capital of Central Java, and Medan, the capital of North Sumatra, to condemn intimidation toward the media, saying thuggery in all forms must be halted to ensure legal certainty and press freedom.

Dean Yates, Jakarta – Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim country, blasted the United States on Tuesday for its ultimatum to Iraq as moderate Islamic leaders warned that war would trigger major street protests.

Wahyoe Boediwardhana, Denpasar – The National Freedom Bulls Party (PNBK) has accused supporters of President Megawati Soekarnoputri's Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan) of attacking its office in Tabanan, Bali, over the weekend.

Robert Go, Jakarta – Indonesian lawmakers, whose official salaries are around $3,000 a month, ride Jaguars and BMWs, and lunch regularly at five-star hotels near the parliamentary compound.

Some have disclosed having millions of dollars in their bank accounts. Senior civil servants make less, officially, so they make do with Mont Blancs and Rolexes.

Kasparman, Padang – Some 1,400 fishermen on Monday threatened to cut off the water supply to the Singkarak hydropower plant in West Sumatra, saying its operations had depleted the Singkarak Lake's fish population.

Jakarta – As many as 31 non-government organisations (NGO) and one political party have agreed to conduct open resistance against the plans for the entry of the military (TNI) into the political and civil chessboard in Indonesia.

Kurniawan Hari, Jakarta – Pressure has continued to rise on the Indonesian Military (TNI) and National Police to stop allowing their personnel to receive "honorariums" from sources other than the state, with observers saying it would weaken the two security forces' commitment and loyalty to the state.

Matthew Moore, Jakarta – When you're talking tar, few cigarettes can match it with Indonesia's kreteks, the aromatic tobacco and clove mix preferred by 90 per cent of smokers here.

The most potent full-flavour cigarettes available in Australia these days have 14milligrams of tar and 1.4mg of nicotine. But in Indonesia the Government has decided high tar will stay.

Devi Asmarani, Jakarta – Five years ago, they were the leading lights of a reform movement that toppled the regime of former President Suharto, surviving such horrors as abduction and torture by the Indonesian army.

But today, some of these erstwhile student and human-rights activists have been accused of losing their way. Some have become establishment figures.

Fabiola Desy Unidjaja, Jakarta – The Indonesian Military (TNI) must stop collecting protection money from firms operating in the country as the largess would confirm the impression that TNI personnel were mercenaries who only sold their services to the highest bidder, analysts say.