East Timor's president-elect Xanana Gusmao met Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri in Jakarta to personally invite her to attend his country's independence celebrations later this month.

"I came here so that Madame the president, Mbak Mega [Older Sister Megawati] can come for the independence celebrations," Gusmao said after meeting Megawati at her home for some 45 minutes on Thursday.

Gusmao, who went to Megawati's residence straight from the airport after arriving on a UN flight, said he will also extend invitations to several other ministers, but gave no further details.

"The invitation has been well received and Madame the president will decide later," Gusmao said when asked whether he had obtained a reply from the president.

Megawati has said she expects to attend East Timor's landmark independence handover next month despite strong opposition from legislators who say that many Indonesians have yet to recover from the loss of the territory which had been part of their country for 24 years. Gusmao immediately went into another meeting with top security minister Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and went afterwards to meet House Speaker Akbar Tanjung.

Yudhoyono congratulated Gusmao on his elections as the first president of the new nation to be inaugurated on May 20. "As a friend we believe that you will be able to lead East Timor to a brighter future, a stable democratic and prosperous nation," Yudhoyono told his guest when welcoming him at his office.

Tanjung, speaking after meeting Gusmao, whose trip was only announced on Wednesday, said he will leave the decision over the visit to East Timor in the hands of the president. Tanjung has been at the forefront of opposition to Megawati making the trip.

"Parliament has already made a statement that the situation is not favorable for the president to go to East Timor, but it is up to the president whether she wants to go there. Of course she may go," Tanjung told reporters. He said Indonesians were still smarting "psychologically" from the loss of East Timor.

Megawati has been invited to the May 19-20 ceremonies by East Timorese leaders and the United Nations, which has been overseeing the impoverished territory's transition to statehood since the traumatic aftermath of its 1999 vote to break away from Indonesia. In an interview with this week's Indonesian Tempo, Gusmao said Megawati's attendence, along with some 15 other heads of state, would be "important for peace." Indonesian Foreign Minister Hassan Wirayuda said Thursday "the president is considering the invitation and will in time announce her decision".

UN Secretary General Kofi Annan will declare the territory independent in a lavish ceremony on the night of May 19 as the clock strikes midnight. Gusmao, who led the guerrilla resistance to Indonesian rule, will be sworn in by Annan just before midnight, following his landslide election on April 14.

Indonesia invaded the former Portuguese colony of East Timor in 1975 and annexed it the following year. Its often harsh rule in the following years led to strong armed resistance from the local pro-independence movement.

Jakarta relinquished East Timor to the United Nations in October 1999 following an overwhelming vote for independence in a UN-run ballot in August that year. Pro-Jakarta militias backed by the Indonesian army laid waste to the territory after the vote.