Tokyo – President Megawati Soekarnoputri said Tuesday the Asia Development Bank (ADB) will likely play a key role in reforming Indonesia after a major IMF programme expires at the end o

East Timor won huge goodwill as it launched into independence.

East Timor is open for business, the world's newest nation said today.

Tom Wright, Jakarta – The International Monetary Fund said it approves of Indonesia's plans to end its current IMF lending program when it runs out this year.

M. Taufiqurrahman, Jakarta – East Timor has called on Indonesians to invest in the country, saying there are a number of business opportunities open to investors.

Dadan Wijaksana, Jakarta – The government is reviewing a presidential decree on public procurements to reduce corruption, but the effort has met with stiff resistance from various sides

Wayne Arnold (New York Times) – Between separatist rebellions, corrupt courts, slumping tourism and rising youth unemployment, Indonesia has plenty to worry about.

Jakarta – Sony Electronics Indonesia Ltd has ended its Indonesian operations and is offering severance pay to its 884 workers.

Dili – The creation of jobs to invigorate East Timor's feeble economy is the Dili government's main objective, Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri said Wednesday at the opening of an internati

Dadan Wijaksana, Jakarta – Indonesia's traditional donors grouped under the Consultative Group on Indonesia (CGI) have welcomed the country's macroeconomic improvements, but warn that s

Robert Go, Jakarta – Major donors, who pledge billions of dollars in loans to Indonesia on a yearly basis, called on the government yesterday to start making progress on its reform prom

Jill Jolliffe, Dili – A Chinese-Malaysian businessman who won a case of illegal arrest against East Timorese police has been re-arrested and jailed within 24 hours of the court decision

Jill Jolliffe, Dili – A court case in which a bodyguard of East Timorese Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri is said to have kicked a Chinese-Malaysian businessman, calling him a monkey, is be

Jakarta – Rupiah on Monday reached its highest level against the dollar since August 2000, sparking concerns that the upturn could be overdone and harm the country's exports.

Bill Guerin, Jakarta – Despite predictions that Indonesian state oil and gas company Pertamina faces a bleak and uncertain future after the government lifted its decades-long oil and ga

Bill Guerin, Jakarta – Publicly listed state-owned pharmaceutical giant Indofarma is in the public eye over its miraculous transformation of a reported Rp88.6 billion profit in the firs

John McBeth, Jakarta – Indonesia's 25-year reign as the world's largest liquefied-natural-gas (LNG) exporter is under threat, though it's taken a distracted government years to wake up

Tony Sitathan, Jakarta – When a troubled commercial bank in Indonesia needed to improve its standing with the public and the business community, it turned to Landor Associates, consider

Fitri Wulandari, Jakarta – The business sector has demanded that the government continue working with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) through a post-program monitoring system, say

Linda Silaen, Jakarta – The International Monetary Fund said Friday that Indonesia's economy in 2004 could grow by more than the government's forecast of between 4% and 5%.

There have been some economists who have argued that exiting the existing IMF programme while simultaneously devising a new economic strategy puts Indonesia's macro-economic stability a

Jakarta – Golkar Party has expressed concern over the Indonesian government's program to privatize and divest a number of state companies, as it has led to the selling of state assets,

Tim Johnston – If the shipping lanes of South-East Asia have their dangers, doing business on land can be just as fraught.

Fitri Wulandari, Jakarta – The Indonesian government is almost certain not to extend its contract with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which will terminate at the end of this yea

Dadan Wijaksana, Jakarta – The debates on whether the government should continue the existing International Monetary Fund program in the country were brought back to life again on Monda

Tony Sitathan, Singapore – The giant Indonesian archipelago enjoys enormous potential fishery resources, as yet under-exploited by the legal fishing industry.

Jakarta – Minister of Finance Boediono expressed optimism on Thursday that the economy will grow by 4 percent this year, despite a downturn in the global economy.

Jakarta – Indonesia's increasing economic stability is not translating into higher growth, the World Bank said on Thursday.

Bill Guerin, Jakarta – Indonesian State Minister for State Enterprises Laksamana Sukardi plans a spinoff of two renegade state enterprises, PT Semen Padang and PT Semen Tonasa, from the

Gary LaMoshi, Denpasar – One of the world's great mysteries, right up there with how Jiang Zemin's hair stayed black for all those years, is that amazing strength of the Indonesian rupi

Bill Guerin, Jakarta – Textile and engineering giant Texmaco announced last week that it had defaulted on a US$25 million letter of credit facility from Bank BNI 46.

Tony Sitathan, Jakarta – The Indonesian government has officially announced that its privatization exercise for several state-owned enterprises (SOEs) will be delayed until the end of t

Devi Asmarani, Jakarta – Indonesia's state-run television station, TVRI, yesterday officially became a state-owned company, a status that will give it more commercial freedom and help i

A'an Suryana, Jakarta – The role of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to oversee the country's economic reform program is still crucial to help maintain investor confidence in the e

Bill Guerin, Jakarta – Cash-strapped state-owned television station Televisi Republik Indonesia (TVRI) has 7,158 employees and 395 relay stations in 26 provinces.

Jakarta – Some 57 small islands in Indonesia are ready to receive investors willing to develop businesses there, the fishing ministry's Director General for Coastal Areas and Small Isla

Shawn Donnan and Taufan Hidayat – When Singapore's ST Telemedia paid $630m last November for a 42 per cent stake in Indosat, Indonesia's number two telecommunications carrier, it was wi

Sonia Kolesnikov, Singapore – The Indonesian economy has so far proven robust, weathering the Bali storm of last October.

Bill Guerin, Jakarta – Eddie Widiono Suwondo, president of state power utility Perusahaan Listrik Negara (PLN), is struggling to bring the virtually bankrupt monopoly back into the blac

Washington (Agencies) – The International Monetary Fund (IMF) on Friday approved a fresh loan worth US$469 million to Indonesia, bringing its total lending to about US$3.5 billion under

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

Jakarta – International credit rating agency Moody's Investors Service has maintained its positive outlook for Indonesia, on the back of the country's political stability and continued

Tony Sitathan, Singapore – After last October's bombing in Bali, Indonesia's foreign investment was hit hard, sliding to a record low.

Highly debatable are both the rationale used by the team of more than 30 economists to support their recommendation for abruptly ending Indonesia's reform program with the International

Robert Go – When Singapore Technologies Telemedia (STT) paid 5.62 trillion rupiah (S$1.2 billion) for Indonesia's second-biggest telephone company last December, the story should have e

Adianto P.

Mark Dodd, Dili – In the laboratory of Cafi Cooperative Timor (CCT), senior adviser Alistair Laird, a "cupping" expert, is applying a final quality-control test to assess the fragrance,

The Investment Coordinating Board (BKPM) released investment figures for the month of January late last week revealing a steep fall in foreign direct investment (FDI) approvals but an u

More troubles surfaced last week in the government and Bank Indonesia's (BI) efforts to cover the costs of the disastrous bank bailout of the late 1990s just as many of those responsibl

Jakarta – Indonesia's economy probably expanded in the fourth quarter as Muslim holy days and other festivals spurred spending on food and gifts, analysts say.