Members of the Indonesian Military (TNI) and the National Police (Polri) were involved in an armed clash yet again on Sunday, apparently in a fashion that displays remnants – if not sid

Damien Kingsbury – States that have been colonised commonly reflect elements of their colonial past.

Max Lane – Between March 24 and 30, a wave of quite militant demonstrations against the coalition government of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono spread throughout Indonesia.

The second round vote for the President of Timor Leste has been announced.

Damien Kingsbury – When East Timor's outgoing president, Jose Ramos-Horta, won office in 2007 by a crushing 69 per cent, many outsiders attributed the victory to his high profile as a c

Victor R Savage – The current presidential election in Timor-Leste has brought international visibility to this rather marginalised state within Southeast Asia.

Rizal Ramli, Jakarta – When Indonesia's students took to the streets in 1998 and won their battle for the overthrow of Soeharto, there was jubilation on campuses across the country.

Al Araf and Ghufron Mabruri, Jakarta – The legislation process in the House of Representatives has always sparked controversy among society.

The bureaucratic reform the country is undertaking is certainly more complicated and daunting than we may have thought, thanks in part to internal resistance, as the controversy centeri

Pat Walsh – On 20 March, Attorney-General Nicola Roxon agreed to a Department of Foreign Affairs request to block public access to 34-year-old cables on the famine that ravaged East Tim

Tim Anderson – East Timorese PM Xanana Gusmao looks likely to lose government to Fretilin in June.

Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono seems almost certain to fall short in his attempt to put in place a 33.3 percent fuel price hike, probably doing incalculable damage to wha

Will Hickey – Indonesia has a burgeoning population with an exponentially growing need for energy, but many still live hand to mouth.

Damien Kingsbury – Jose Ramos-Horta's decision to support the Democratic Party (PD) in the parliamentary elections has two sets of implications for Timor-Leste's politics.

Dwi Atmanta – The countdown for the Jakarta gubernatorial election has begun, although the provincial poll commission has yet to declare eligible tickets for the race.

Armando Siahaan – From the corruption saga implicating Democratic Party politicos to the plan to cut fuel subsidies, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono is facing a public relations cris

Pangeran Siahaan – As you line up at the cashier at the supermarket, take a look at the shelf on your side, which is likely to contain an array of candies and chocolate bars.

Brendan Brady – When residents of Dili voted to elect a new president five years ago, more than a hundred thousand displaced people were scattered about the city in tent camps and gangs

Damien Kingsbury – East Timor incumbent president, Jose Ramos-Horta, has failed in his bid for re-election, with his former key rival, Fretilin's Francisco "Lu-Olo" Guterres, and former

Anna Powles, Dili – Timorese voters will go to the polls twice this year to elect the nation's president and parliament for the third time since achieving independence in 2001.

Meidyatama Suryodiningrat – Some attitudes are hard to change.

Yohanes Sulaiman & Phillip Turnbull – It appears we're having a coup. Or at least that is what some in the government would have us believe.

Last week, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono tried to reiterate his supposed commitment to fighting corruption when he signed off on new punishments for graft convicts.

The government is dead serious in entertaining the idea of a plot being underway to bring down President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono by creating massive chaos via rioting when the governme

Yohanes Sulaiman & Phillip Turnbull – On Saturday, the violence-wracked Mesuji district in Lampung again grabbed the headlines as a riot took place, with hundreds of villagers burni

Inggrid Galuh Mustikawati – The early months of 2012 have seen several violent land disputes in Indonesia.

Organizing a massive movement of people for quite a long period of time with complex human relations and managerial problems, like the 40-day-long Indonesian haj pilgrimage, is indeed n

Over the last three weeks, at least three surveys have uncovered a growing public distrust of political parties, all because of corruption cases plaguing their leaders and individual me

Razali Ritonga, Jakarta – The labor protests over minimum wage demands that recently occurred in some parts of Indonesia should have been anticipated by the government.

Damien Kingsbury – As Timor-Leste heads into the three rounds of 2012 elections, election observers have begun to organise to monitor the election process and to report their findings.

The money laundering charges slapped on Monday by the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) on Muhammad Nazaruddin, fondly known as Nazar, a former House member and Democratic Party t

Damien Kingsbury – The various contenders for Timor-Leste's presidency in the 17 March election have begun to try to persuade the voting public why they should be elected as president.

Jim Della-Giacoma – Early in 2010, Afghan President Hamid Karzai was sitting in Kabul with some diplomats who had served in Indonesia and Timor-Leste.

Agus Wandi – On a recent trip to East Timor, while talking to fishermen on Areia Branca Beach, hanging out with taxi drivers, getting lost cycling in Dili with its new street names, cat

Damien Kingsbury – As Timor-Leste's political climate warms up ahead of next month's presidential elections, many people are asking who is most likely to be elected president.

Bramantyo Prijosusilo – One year ago today, Indonesia hit the headlines with the murder of three members of the Islamic Ahmadiyah sect, by a mob over a thousand strong in a small town n

The decision by the Supreme Court to uphold the conviction of 54-year Rasmiah for petty theft prompted a chorus of condemnation on the state of our judicial system.

Damien Kingsbury – The announcement by President Jose Ramos-Horta that he will seek re-election for a second term in office has thrown open Timor-Leste's presidential race, all but guar

John McBeth, Jakarta – Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono is in danger of being caught in the crossfire between a newly emboldened parliament and the Indonesian military over

There was no exaggeration when senior Democratic Party politician Marzuki Alie allegorized the conundrum currently facing the ruling party as a "devastating tsunami".

Regarded as an authority on Indonesian affairs, Australian academic Richard Robison is the author of the best-selling book, Indonesia: The Rise of Capital, which looks at the growth of

Marcel Thee – For too many years, local comics have sacrificed their pride and even their bodies for laughs.

Vincent Lingga – For such an important policy reform that has been on and off the national agenda since late 2007, the debates on the need to limit subsidized-fuel sales that dominated

Megawati Wijaya, Jakarta – Draft legislation to redenominate Indonesia's currency is expected to gain momentum this year as lawmakers and monetary authorities push to drop the last thre

The much-anticipated trial of former Democratic Party treasurer Muhammad Nazaruddin has taken a new twist that may complicate the case after a key witness unveiled the role of powerful

Ratih Hardjono, Jakarta – With so much political jockeying going on among the elites in Jakarta ahead of the 2014 presidential election, the fact that 67 million first-time voters acros

Dwi Atmanta – Thousands of protesters, reportedly from various regions across the archipelago, rallied outside the State Palace on Thursday in another push for long-awaited agrarian ref

Armando Siahaan – If law enforcers would go after high-level corruption the same way they handled the kid who stole a pair of sandals from a police officer, just imagine how clean this

As in the past, the House of Representatives marked the first day of its first legislative session in 2012 with a high-sounding pledge on Monday.

Calvin Michel Sidjaja – 2011 was not a good year for human rights in Indonesia.