Jakarta – Shoot-on-sight orders were issued to police as the death toll in fresh violence between two ethnic groups in the Indonesian province of West Kalimantan rose to five when a mob attacked a police post, reports and police said Wednesday.

Bandung – Student leaders agreed on Sunday after a three-day meeting to support the upcoming general election, which they have deemed unfair for being based on defective political laws, as they said to call off the election would lead to more trouble.

Jonathan Head, Ambon – One man has been killed and seven injured on the Indonesian island of Ambon after the security forces opened fire during renewed inter-religious fighting.

The clash broke out after two Muslim-owned houses were burnt down in the city of Ambon.

Jeremy Wagstaff, Legok – The inhabitants of this flyblown hamlet are angry. They are angry about rising prices, the lack of jobs, and lingering government corruption, says village headman Effendi bin Musa. They are even annoyed with the ineffectiveness of Mr. Effendi himself, he concedes. But what really made the feathers fly was the price of chickens.

Jakarta – A son of former President Suharto has been charged with corruption, along with a former senior official and another businessman, an Indonesian official said Monday.

Jakarta – A mass fight between two neighbouring villages in West Java left one man dead, eight others injured and more than 100 houses damaged, a report said here Monday.

The fight between people from Danamulya and Kedungsana villages in the Cirebon district on the northern coast of West Java erupted on Friday, the Suara Karya daily said.

Ujungpandang – Regional police chiefs in Indonesia will be sacked if they defy an order from Indonesian Armed Forces (ABRI) Commander General Wiranto to shoot rioters and criminals on the spot, says an official.

National Police Chief General Roesmanhadi yesterday said all military personnel must obey all instructions issued by their superiors.

Jakarta – Politicians, public figures and university rectors in Central Java have recommended that parties be permitted to campaign on campuses in the run-up to the June 7 general election.

The agreement was reached in a discussion at Amanda Hotel in Bandungan city over the weekend. It was attended by representatives of 112 universities in the province.

Jakarta – Scores of Indonesian students held a vigil at a university here Sunday to mark 100 days after the violent shooting of student demonstrators late last year.

Jakarta – Underscoring its high-profile role in the country, the Indonesian military has warned it would not tolerate any attempt to disrupt upcoming elections and told workers that instead of staging protests, they should help maintain security and order.

The fact that many Indonesians look in quite a jovial mood these days does not mean that the devastating economic crisis has ended. They simply say they have a jocular topic in their daily conversation: the leakage of a telephone conversation between President B.J. Habibie and Attorney General Andi M.

Jakarta – After more than two weeks of investigation directly following the unrest, the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) has concluded that the January 19- 23 Ambon riots were, as widely suspected, engineered.

Jakarta – Indonesia's Parliament passed a law aimed at stamping out monopolies, cartels and other restrictive competitive practices.

The antimonopoly law, which must be ratified by President B.J. Habibie before it comes into force, will regulate mergers and acquisitions, and limit the amount of market share one company can attain.

Andrew Marshall, Jakarta – Indonesia is in the grip of an economic paralysis that cannot be broken until its debt-ridden, capital-starved companies can escape the straitjacket of their ruinous foreign liabilities.

Jakarta – The basic minimum wage in Indonesia's 27 provinces is to be raised an average 16.1 percent from April 1, reports said Friday.

However, companies that could not afford the raise should apply for a postponment, the director general for industrial relations and labour supervision, Syaufii Syamsuddin, was quoted by the Kompas daily as saying.

Jenny Grant, Jakarta – A transcript of an alleged telephone conversation between President Bacharuddin Habibie and Attorney-General Andi Ghalib published yesterday suggests the graft investigation focusing on ex-president Suharto is a farce.

Jakarta – Opposition presidential hopeful Amien Rais has called on several Indonesian parties, mostly Moslem, to unite to prevent the return of current President Habibie to power later this year, newspapers reported Thursday.

Jakarta – An Indonesian soldier Thursday told a military court here that more than nine activists had been kidnapped by troops in the last months of the Suharto regime.

Surabaya – More than 10,000 workers gathered outside a large electronics and plastics factory in Surabaya, East Java, Thursday as their campaign for better working conditions entered its sixth day.

Surabaya – After days of mass protests by workers demanding better working conditions, the owners and management of a giant electronic and household gods factory in Indonesia Thursday announced it was willing to meet the demand of employees.

Jakarta – Dozens of students protested at the Indonesian military headquarters and the National Strategic Planning Board Thursday over the military's role in politics and alleged corruption in the use of foreign loans.

Jakarta – Panicked Indonesian security forces shot a nun in the neck on Thursday as they tried to disperse a crowd in the eastern spice islands after a bomb blast, police and witnesses said.

Jakarta – About 500 people rallied outside the attorney general's office Wednesday in a protest against a corruption investigation of former President Suharto.

The protesters said Suharto, who quit last May amid riots and protests against his authoritarian rule, was innocent and had been framed by his opponents. Suharto, 77, has denied any wrongdoing.

Jakarta – The Peoples Democratic Party (PRD) has decided to participate in the 1999 elections. The Chairperson of the Central Leadership Council of the Peoples Democratic Party (KPP-PRD), Faizol Reza, announced this at a press conference held in the offices of the Indonesian Legal Aid Foundation (YLBHI) on Tuesday afternoon, February 16.

Jakarta – Four junior Indonesian army officers undergoing a court martial for a series of kidnappings admitted on Tuesday abducting political activists in the last months of the Suharto regime.

Jakarta – The Coordinating Minister for Politics and Security, Faisal Tanjung, said that it was not inconceivable that civil emergency law would be instituted if rioting was to continue. Even so, according to Tanjung, President Habibie still refused to decide on initiating emergency law despite a number of his ministers supporting the idea.

Jakarta – President BJ Habibie yesterday revealed, for the first time, military movements launched by Lieut.-Gen. [ret] Prabowo Subianto on May 22 last year following the downfall of former President Soeharto, Prabowo's father-in-law.

Susan Sim, Jakarta – Institutional discrimination is still visible in Indonesia because the government has not removed its legal basis, human rights activists said as they took issue with President B. J. Habibie's recent statement that he has abolished all discriminatory policies here.

Jakarta – An Indonesian church group has accused police of opening fire on unarmed villagers during the latest outbreak of Moslem-Christian violence to hit the eastern province of Maluku.

The accusation was made as President B.J. Habibie said Monday that the recent religious clashes in the country had their roots in economic problems.

Jakarta – Indonesia's military police have failed to identify any soldiers who opened fire during a student protest in Jakarta three months ago in which 13 people were killed, an official said Monday.

"Up till now the military police have not been able to find the shooters in the Semanggi incident," military police chief Major General Djasri Missin told a press conference.

Jakarta – The ruling Golkar party will nominate incumbent President B.J. Habibie as its candidate for Indonesia's upcoming presidential election, a party official said Monday.

Jakarta – More than 100,000 supporters of Indonesian opposition politician Megawati Sukarnoputri crowded into a south Jakarta stadium Sunday to endorse her candidacy for the presidency.

Jakarta – At least 13 people were killed and 43 injured when troops and police opened fire to quell fresh Moslem-Christian clashes in Indonesia's troubled eastern province of Maluku on Sunday morning, residents and reports said.

Jose Manuel Tesoro, Jakarta – In the Indonesian political equation, the elements – Islamic groups, student fronts, opposition parties, military factions – are legion and ever-changing. Possible permutations – a coalition, a new government, martial law, absolute chaos – multiply daily. But in everyone's political calculus is one shadowy constant: Suharto.

Jakarta – Influential Muslim leader Abdurrahman Wahid has warned that a social revolution in Indonesia could claim up to three million lives and all parties should therefore work to prevent the possibility of such a national disaster, the Indonesian Observer newspaper reported yesterday.

Jakarta – Indonesian police opened fire on thousands of workers staging a protest in East Java, wounding four people while another was injured by a rifle butt, a report said Friday.

Some 3,000 workers at PT Sinar Indo Megantara in Surabaya held a protest on Thursday to demand the personnel manager resigns, the Republika daily said.

Jakarta – The newly formed National Awakening Party (PKB) has nominated popular Moslem leader Abdurrahman "Gus Dur" Wahid as its candidate for the presidency at the upcoming elections, a newspaper said Friday.

"This is serious. The PKB is nominating Gus Dur," PKB executive Muhaimin Iskandar was quoted by the Jakarta Post daily as saying.

Jakarta – Under the watchful eyes of some 300 supporters of the defendants, the Central Jakarta District Court on Wednesday conducted a speedy trial for all 55 student protesters arrested for holding an illegal rally on Tuesday.

Jakarta – Three out of 11 Indonesian soldiers being court martialled for a series of kidnappings Thursday admitted to abducting some political activists, a witness said.

Three junior officers from the elite army Kopassus special force described how they were involved in kidnapping eight pro-democracy activists.

Jakarta – In a highly critical self-assessment the World Bank has admitted it may have overlooked warning signs as the "Indonesian miracle" faded because of a desire not to upset Jakarta.

McCarthy, Jakarta – Indonesian elections and the prospect of a new government this year probably won't derail the country's major economic reform program, the International Monetary Fund's top official in Asia, Hubert Neiss, said Wednesday.

Jakarta – Forty-nine new political parties have registered at the Justice Ministry to contest the June general election, but only 17 have met administrative requirements, officials said yesterday.

Rasi Manopo, secretary of the ministry's registration committee, said 49 parties have applied to participate in the June 7 election since registrations commenced on February 5.

Jakarta – Observers urged the Armed Forces (ABRI) on Monday to reconsider its shoot-on-sight order against rioters, saying that capturing the masterminds of recent unrest would do more to improve the military's image.

Jakarta – The initial findings of an investigation by the attorney general's office and the foreign ministry have failed to find any wealth or assets belonging to former president Suharto abroad, a report said Tuesday.

Jakarta – Indonesian security forces arrested scores of students Tuesday as they marched towards parliament in the first big anti-government demonstration this year, witnesses said.

Olle Tornquist, Oslo – Almost every day, I am asked two questions. The first is terribly hard to answer in a manner both brief and academically considered: what's happening to democratization in Indonesia?

Jakarta – Indonesia's official Human Rights Commission said on Monday religious rioting could easily break out again in the eastern island of Ambon, saying the death toll from clashes last month had passed 160.

Commissioner Albert Hasibuan criticised the military for being ineffective in preventing the unrest erupting and slow in putting it down.

Jakarta The rush to prepare independent observers of the polls, slated to take place in barely five months, continues as the country's two largest Muslim organizations cooperate to prepare 123,600 volunteer poll observers.

They have no identity and are nameless. They are almost invisible, and, above all, certainly untouchable. Yet, they are so powerful as to have left a trail of untold deaths and massive destruction across the country in the space of only a few months.

Greg Earl, Jakarta – Indonesia has pushed ahead with its new quest for international assistance, as Japan confirmed it would provide $US2.4 billion before Indonesia holds general elections in June.