Jakarta – The leaders of 11 political groupings have formed an opposition forum to prevent a victory by the ruling Golkar party in the next elections in 1999, newspapers quoted leaders of the political groups as saying. "A Golkar victory should be prevented, Golkar should the halted, rather than let the state be ruined," Ridwan Saidi, head of the Masyumi Baru Party, said.

Jakarta - Reports on the rape of Chinese Indonesian women during the widespread rioting last May have been baffling the people as these reports lack proof, an observer here has said.

Jakarta – Church officials and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) expressed their belief yesterday that a number of bodies found recently near Biak island, Irian Jaya, might be related to the military's shooting on pro-independence activists earlier this month.

Sydney – The United States is encouraging Indonesia's military to exercise restraint as the embattled Asian country copes with financial meltdown and social unrest, Defense Secretary William Cohen said Thursday.

John McBeth, Jakarta - Just a few months ago, Badan Urusan Logistik Nasional was the government-run monopoly everyone loved to hate. As late as April, the logistics agency for basic foodstuffs, better known as Bulog, was the prime example of all that was wrong with doing business in Suharto's Indonesia.

Carol Giacomo, Sydney – Conditions in financially embattled Indonesia are expected to worsen significantly by the year's end, according to US and Asian officials. Some of the estimates go far beyond current projections, fanning fears that the world's most populous Moslem nation faces starvation and could implode.

Paris – Here are the main points of the statement issued by the World Bank after some 30 donor countries and international organisations agreed here on Thursday to provide 7.9 billion dollars to Indonesia:

Sigli, Aceh – Several women testified to a parliamentary fact-finding mission on a visit to Sigli about their experiences at the hands of the security forces. The testimony was given at a meeting attended by about one thousand people, most of them widows and orphans.

Banda Aceh – Non-governmental organisations (NGO) have told a parliamentary group investigating violence in this autonomous Indonesian region that some 600 women had been raped over the past seven years, many allegedly by the military.

Jakarta - The July 27 incident is already two years past, but the Minister of Home Affairs, Syarwan Hamid, continues to be asked to take responsibility for his involvement in engineering the overthrow of Megawati Sukarnoputri as chairperson of the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI).

Jay Solomon, Jakarta – Indonesian police, amid growing pressure on authorities to get to the heart of May riots, believe they may have found one of the instigators: a retired crime lord turned Islamic preacher.

Jakarta – Two People's Democratic Party (PRD) political prisoners who receive an amnesty from President B.J. Habibie, Wilson bin Nurtiyas and Ken Budha Kusumandaru, were forcibly evicted from the Cipinang Prison, Jakarta.

In a statement issued on 24 July 1998, the Indonesian Legal Aid and Human Rights Association (PBHI) has strongly criticised the Indonesian government's decision to set up a fact-fidning team to investigate a series of crimes, in particular the crimes which occurred during the riots in Jakarta on 13 - 15 May this year.

Yogyakarta – Clashes broke out here Sunday between followers of opposition politican Megawati Sukarnoputri and a rival party after some 30,000 Megawati supporters had held a peaceful rally, witnesses and police said.

Jakarta – The police are hunting suspected rioters who attacked and set fire to the Taman Sari Subregency Office, West Jakarta. Some of them are already known. According to the West Jakarta police resort chief who was contacted Saturday (25/7), they are seasonal workers who have lately come to work as tricycle drivers.

Jack Anderson and Jan Moller – Rooting out corruption and cronyism in Indonesia in the wake of President Suharto's 32-year rule will be difficult, if not impossible. Even the mythological Hercules, who cleaned the Augean stables by diverting a river, would have found a daunting task in Indonesia.

Jakarta – Coordinating Minister for Political and Security Affairs Feisal Tanjung has denied knowing of – and much less ordering – the kidnapping of more than 20 Indonesian pro-reform activists, press reports said Saturday.

Jakarta – Indonesia has issued a law governing where and when street demonstrations can be held, the official Antara news agency reported on Saturday. It said President B.J. Habibie signed the decree on freedom of expression on Friday.

Jakarta – The government has officially granted amnesty to six prisoners and abolution to 44 political detainees. Government will also rehabilitate the late HR Dharsono's good reputation. Minister of Justice Muladi together with Attorney General AM Ghalib, issued this statement to reporters after he was received by President BJ Habibie at Bina Graha, Jakarta, on Friday (24/7).

Surabaya - The Brawijaya Military Commander, Major-General Djoko Subroto has denied that his personnel [were responsible for] abducting student activists in East Java some time ago. However he did admit to "arresting" People's Democratic Party (PRD) and [PRD affiliated] Student Solidarity for Indonesian Democracy (SMID) activists.

Washington – There are indications high Indonesian military officials were involved in kidnapping and torturing pro-democracy activists, including those who remain missing, US officials told lawmakers Friday.

Jakarta – Abdurrahman Wahid, chairman of the Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) Moslem organization, sounded a rallying call yesterday for the newly founded People's Awakening Party (PKB), declaring it was an open organization without ethnic or religious prejudice.

Jakarta – A poll jointly conducted by the University of Indonesia and Soegeng Sarjadi Syndicated shows that in the first three-months of his presidency, B.J. Habibie's policies have failed to win over the hearts of the people.

President Habibie has appointed an all-female task force to investigate the rapes of Chinese women during the May riots. Human rights groups have detailed at least 168 cases and 20 deaths. This is one woman's story.

John McBeth, Jakarta – Down a narrow side street in a crowded East Jakarta suburb is a small nondescript office marked by a white banner with a red cross.

Jakarta – A new World Bank report says the Indonesian economy, at its most critical stage in more than three decades, will likely make a slight recovery of 2 percent to 4 percent growth in 2000, after an estimated contraction of 10 percent to 15 percent in 1998.

Keith B. Richburg, Jakarta – Indonesia has a food problem. It's not that food isn't available – it's that most people cannot afford the sky-high prices for basic goods, so they are cutting back on how much, and how often, they eat.

Jakarta – Since yesterday night, around 200 PT Mayora Indah women workers have been staying at the Jakarta Indonesian Legal Aid Offices (LBH) because they are afraid of intimidation and other acts of terror following a clash at the company last week.

Medan – Hundreds of people burned vehicles, houses and warehouses in Indonesia's north Sumatran town of Porsea following a dispute over logging with rayon company PT Inti Indorayon, witnesses said on Wednesday. There were no reports of casualties in the violence, which occurred on Tuesday, the witnesses said.

Jakarta – An Indonesian political activist kidnapped in March and later held in police custody said on Tuesday he believed he had been abducted by security forces.

After some period of no protests or open forums being held on the Gajah Mada University (UGM) in Yogyakarta, Central Java, on Tuesday, July 20, a mass organisation calling itself the Yogyakarta People's Coalition (Koalisi Rakyat Yogyakarta, KRY) began rocking the UGM Boulevard.

Amy Chew, Jakarta – Indonesian opposition figure Megawati Sukarnoputri will tell supporters to occupy parliament if the government does not endorse her as legitimate leader of the minority Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI) by November, a senior PDI official said on Tuesday.

Surabaya – Angry mobs in Indonesia's East Java have attacked shops and homes owned by Moslems they accuse of supporting ethnic Chinese traders, religious sources and residents said on Monday.

John Aglionby, Cibedug – Being beaten up by Indonesian soldiers was worth it, Ujung Jusuf says, if that is the price of recovering land he and his fellow villagers say was stolen from them by the former dictator Suharto.

Andreas Harsono, Jakarta – The heyday of Indonesian conglomerates is apparently over. The meltdown of the rupiah, which painfully inflated their foreign debt, widespread anti-Chinese riots and a new bankruptcy law have forced the big corporations into a life-and-death fight for survival.

Jakarta – Indonesia's two largest Moslem groups have said they will form political parties to contest next year's general elections, newspapers reported on Monday.

Republika daily quoted Moslem leader Amien Rais, one of those in the forefront of the movement leading to the ouster of President Suharto in May, as saying he would set up a political party soon.

Seth Mydans, Jakarta – Human rights workers who are investigating scores of organized gang rapes during three days of rioting here in May say they and the victims have been receiving threats from unidentified men.

Jakarta – Abdurrahman Wahid, Megawati Soekarnoputri and Bishop Carlos Felipe Ximenes Belo, in a unique gathering, yesterday called on the government to form a coalition with reform leaders to lead the nation out of the economic crisis.

Jakarta – The Armed Forces (ABRI, warned yesterday it win crack down hard against looters amid growing signs of a breakdown of law and order in some parts of the country.

Jennifer Hewett, Washington – The amount of poverty in Indonesia is likely to double during the next year, according to a new report from the World Bank which says that no country in history has suffered such a dramatic reversal of fortune.

Jakarta – Some 80 women of the Indonesian Women's Coalition for Justice and Democracy (KPIKD), on Friday (17/7) staged a demonstration in front of the Department of Defense & Security on Jalan Merdeka Barat, Jakarta.

Following a meeting in Jakarta between Indonesian opposition leaders Abdulrachman Wahid, leader of the mass-based Nadlatul Ulama, and Megawati Sukarnoputri, leader of the PDI, the two opposition leaders expressed support for Bishop Belo's position on the question of East Timor.

Jay Solomon and Wayne Arnold, Solo – The economists and politicians trying to fathom how many billions of dollars will buy stability in Indonesia would do well to come read the signs here in the seat of the Javanese heartland.

Jay Solomon, Sleman – At high noon July 7, 700 Indonesian villagers descended upon this district's local legislature in a noisy convoy of motorcycles, red banners and clove cigarette smoke.

Major-General Syamsu Djalal announced earlier this week that seven officers of the army's elite corps, Kopassus, have been arrested in connection with the disappearance of a number of activists since mid-1997. He said that five lower and middle-ranking officers had already been charged and that two others, a colonel and an officer of higher rank, were still under investigation.

Jakarta – An Indonesian minister said some political parties which have sprung up in recent months will not be legally recognised, the Jakarta Post reported on Thursday.

Sharon Ayling – Under extreme duress, Indonesia agreed June 25 to accept terms dictated by the International Monetary Fund as a condition for receiving outstanding payments on a $43 billion loan.

John Aglionby – Lisa's parents are amazed she is still alive. On June 18, a week after her ninth birthday, this Chinese-Indonesian girl who lives 20 miles outside the north Sumatran city of Medan chose to walk home from school rather than wait for her elder sister Martha.

Andi Arief, who heads SMID, the student wing of the People's Democratic Party, was released on Tuesday [July 14] and has now returned to his parents' home in Lampung, South Sumatra.

Jakarta – Coffee beans are travelling under armed guard in Indonesia amid growing looting, traders said yesterday.