Indonesia’s new central bank governor said on Friday he will seek “good negotiations” with overseas monetary authorities on banking reciprocity. Indonesia’s central bank governor Agus Martowardojo told reporters shortly after his swearing-in ceremony that he would respect the country’s current regulations on banking reciprocity and look to negotiate the issue with his foreign counterparts. Indonesia’s [...]

Indonesian inflation is expected to be minus 0.8 percent month-on-month in May, deputy central bank governor Perry Warjiyo said on Friday. The April month-on-month figure was -0.10 percent. April year-on-year inflation was 5.57 percent, just above the central bank’s target for the year. http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/05/24/indonesia-economy-inflation-idUSL3N0E50M720130524?feedType=RSS&feedName=financialsSector&rpc=43

Dai-ichi Life Insurance Co. (8750) will acquire a roughly 40 percent stake in Indonesia’s Panin Group by purchasing new shares to be issued by the local firm’s insurance unit, Panin Life, for an estimated Y30 billion, the Nikkei reported in its Friday evening edition. Panin Life is a midsize insurer with assets totalling about Y40 [...]

The US is expressing concern over increased attacks on religious minorities in Indonesia, but human rights groups accuse Washington of downplaying the problem as it looks to forge stronger relations with Jakarta. Muslim-majority Indonesia has emerged as Southeast Asia’s most robust democracy since the fall of longtime dictator Suharto 15 years ago. But recent years [...]

As Myanmar’s leaders push a series of political and economic changes, they are also having to deal with between the majority Buddhists and minority Muslims, or Rohingya. Many countries making the transition from authoritarian rule to democracy have faced similar ethnic and sectarian conflicts, from Iraq to the former Yugoslavia. But for Myanmar, perhaps the [...]

Indonesian event organiser Risti Rahmadi wears an Islamic headscarf, uses halal lipstick and knows that it’s time to pray when an app on her BlackBerry emits Koranic verses five times a day. The 37-year-old, who in her 20s would save up for the latest Guess clothes and Revlon make-up, now strictly buys products that show [...]

Indonesia’s energy regulator says the country’s oil production target next year is too optimistic, and wants it scaled back between roughly 4 percent and 8 percent, domestic media reported on Thursday. The former OPEC member was once self-sufficient in oil and gas but has been struggling for years to attract investment to halt declining oil [...]

Indonesia’s energy regulator says the country’s oil production target next year is too optimistic, and wants it scaled back between roughly 4 percent and 8 percent, domestic media reported on Thursday. The former OPEC member was once self-sufficient in oil and gas but has been struggling for years to attract investment to halt declining oil [...]

Indonesia’s government bonds fell, driving the 10-year yield to a seven-month high, after the central bank signaled the next move in interest rates is likely to be an increase. The rupiah fell for a fourth day. “We already changed to neutral since February last year and now we’re even moving toward a tightening bias,” deputy [...]

A leading scientist has rated Indonesia’s water management policies as among the worst in the world, and called for greater use of research and technology improve access to the precious resource for drinking and irrigation. Herry Harjono, the executive director of the Asia-Pacific centre for Ecohydrology and a senior researcher with the Indonesian Institute of [...]

The Indonesian government and a United States-based mining company will appoint an independent team to investigate the collapse of a training tunnel last week near the company’s operations in the remote Papua region that killed 28 local workers, officials said Wednesday. Rescue workers on Tuesday night recovered the last body from the debris of the [...]

Mining giant Freeport Indonesia said on Wednesday it remains uncertain when it will restart operations after an accident last week at its eastern Indonesian gold and copper mines, news that that analysts say helped drive up copper prices in global markets. The company, a unit of Phoenix-based Freeport-McMoran Copper & Gold Inc., FCX -1.00 percent [...]

Axiata Group Bhd, Malaysia’s largest mobile-phone operator, is evaluating a bid for PT Axis Telekom Indonesia, according to three people with knowledge of the matter. Any offer for Axis would be made by Axiata’s Indonesian unit, PT XL Axiata, the people said, asking not to be identified as the information was private. Purchasing the Indonesian [...]

Not many finance professionals who cover Indonesia’s biggest property companies have heard of The Ning King, the 82-year-old founder of closely held Indonesian conglomerate Argo Manunggal Group. The – pronounced Tay – owns half of PT Alam Sutera Realty (ASRI), which developed for almost two decades a town west of Jakarta comprised of 30 residential [...]

Rescuers have recovered seven more bodies from a collapsed mine tunnel in eastern Indonesia, its US operator said Wednesday, taking the accident’s final toll to 28. The rescue team “recovered and identified the last of the remains of the buried workers early this morning”, the Indonesian subsidiary of Freeport-McMoRan said in a statement. Thirty-eight workers [...]

Indonesia’s deputy minister of Trade has called for New Zealand to evolve into a “true partner” that will help Indonesia solve its problems. Speaking at an Indonesia/New Zealand business forum in Jakarta, Bayu Krisnamurthi said the huge disparity in the size of the two countries’ populations made it difficult to explain to Indonesia’s parliament, constituents [...]

Indonesia on Tuesday approved the purchase by Singapore’s DBS of a 40 percent stake in Bank Danamon, but demanded the city-state open up its financial sector before any full takeover. More than a year after DBS launched its bid to make the biggest ever bank acquisition in Indonesia, central bank governor Darmin Nasution said it [...]

The death toll from a mine tunnel collapse in eastern Indonesia has risen to 21, the US operator said Tuesday, as rescuers searched for another seven workers now also presumed dead. The accident happened on May 14 at Freeport-McMoRan’s Grasberg, one of the world’s biggest gold and copper mines in mountainous, remote Papua province, and [...]

Indonesia could see the inflation rate accelerating to 7 percent this year if the government raises fuel prices in Southeast Asia’s largest economy, the new finance minister said on Tuesday. At the end of 2012, the annual inflation rate was 4.3 percent. Muhamad Chatib Basri was sworn in as minister on Tuesday. Many economists believe [...]

An Indonesian tycoon who owns a big stake in a huge copper and gold prospect taken from Australia’s Intrepid Mines last year is willing to resolve the ownership dispute, he said in a letter to an investor looking to oust the company’s board. The dispute is over the Tujuh Bukit project, potentially holding 30 million [...]

Indonesia’s new Finance minister Chatib Basri said cutting fuel subsidies and building more infrastructure will be his two main priorities. Reducing subsidies will strengthen the rupiah, Asia’s worst performer in the past 12 months excluding the yen, Basri said in a Bloomberg TV interview today with Rishaad Salamat. The land acquisition law, signed by President [...]

The confirmed death toll from an underground mining accident at a big mine run by PT Freeport Indonesia in Papua has risen to 17 people, with authorities saying the tally likely will rise to 28 in the coming days, making this one of the country’s worst mining disasters. Nine more bodies were pulled from the [...]

Another people smuggler has been arrested by Indonesian police in the most concerted effort in years to catch and lock up those who transport refugees by boat to Australia. Alleged Iranian smuggling kingpin Mohammad Hadi, also known as Sayed Ali, was arrested with two accomplices at 2am on Monday in an apartment building in West [...]

Indonesia’s president on Monday named the country’s investment chief as the new finance minister, putting him in charge of Southeast Asia’s top economy at a time of major challenges. Chatib Basri, who is taking on the role ahead of elections in 2014, replaces Hatta Rajasa, who was stand-in finance minister for a few weeks after [...]

Bank Indonesia set its first fixing for the rupiah 0.2 percent stronger than an equivalent rate in Singapore, where the central bank has started a probe to ascertain whether onshore rates were manipulated. Indonesia’s monetary authority will require local lenders to use its Jakarta Interbank Spot Dollar Rate, which it fixed at 9,760 per dollar [...]

Indonesia’s government is assuming there will be a 45 percent rise in the price of subsidised petrol, a move widely seen as essential to relieve mounting pressure on the state finances. The government has been agonising for months over how and when to hike prices of heavily subsidised fuel, which consume an increasingly large portion [...]

Rescuers recovered five more bodies from a collapsed underground room at a giant US-owned gold and copper mine in Indonesia, bringing the confirmed death toll to 14, police said Monday. Fourteen other workers were still missing and feared dead. The Big Gossan underground training facility at the PT Freeport Indonesia mine collapsed last Tuesday when [...]

Indonesia opened a rights tender for 21 oil and gas exploration blocks, two of which are for unconventional gas concessions on the islands of Borneo and Sumatra, as South-East Asia’s largest economy moves to shore up its energy security. Besides two shale gas blocks, the tender includes 17 offshore blocks that are mostly in the [...]

Twelve workers have been confirmed dead after a mine tunnel collapse in eastern Indonesia, but 16 others are still unaccounted for five days after the accident, the US operator said Sunday. Rescuers on Saturday retrieved one more body and spotted the remains of six other workers, although they have not managed to reach them yet, [...]

A British woman could face the death penalty in Indonesia after being arrested for allegedly smuggling crystal methamphetamine into the country from China, an official said Saturday. The woman, identified only by her initials AR, was arrested at a hotel in the city of Surabaya, East Java province, last month with 1.47 kilograms (three pounds, [...]

Under Secretary for Political Affairs Wendy R. Sherman will travel to Indonesia, India, and Bangladesh from May 21 to May 28. Under Secretary Sherman will travel to Indonesia May 21-23 to participate in the US-Indonesia Global Policy Dialogue, and will meet with senior Indonesian government officials to discuss bilateral, regional, and global issues. The Global [...]

Rescuers are working for a fourth day to dig through a caved-in tunnel at a giant US-owned gold and copper mine in Indonesia to try to reach 23 trapped workers. The operator of the Grasberg mine in Indonesia’s province of Papua, PT Freeport Indonesia, said Friday that rescuers had successfully cleared two passages to provide [...]

Voters in the Philippines appear to have delivered a resounding victory to President Benigno Aquino in midterm elections. The son of former President Corazon Aquino looks set to control both houses of Congress, giving him a mandate to continue his reform policies. His biggest worry now is making them stick. In the first half of [...]

Indonesia may allow DBS Group Holdings Ltd to buy Temasek Holdings Pte. Ltd’s entire 67 percent stake in PT Bank Danamon Indonesia if certain conditions are met, Bambang Brodjonegoro, head of the fiscal policy office at Indonesia’s ministry of finance, said Friday. DBS’s bid to buy up to 99 percent of Bank Danamon-which was set [...]

Indonesia’s foreign minister called for a new treaty spanning across Asia to help build trust, warning of the potential for conflict in the fast-changing region if tensions fester. On a visit to Washington, Foreign minister Marty Natalegawa said that a new treaty could help end “the all-too-familiar vicious cycle of tensions” in Asia and instead [...]

Indonesian police on Thursday arrested two men with alleged links to a terror network targeted in recent raids and seized bomb-making material, machetes and swords, an official said. More than 20 suspects have now been arrested and eight killed in police raids on Java and Sumatra islands in the past two weeks, as Indonesia carries [...]

Indonesia has had no shortage of scandals in its decade-long fight against endemic corruption, mostly involving middle-aged politicians, suspicious bank accounts, handoffs of briefcases in hotel elevators, or boxes of cash in the trunk of a car in a dark parking garage. World Twitter Logo. Yet throw in political Islam, hotel room sex, luxury automobiles, [...]

Indonesia has approved a two-year extension to a landmark ban on clearing primary rainforests and peatlands, officials said Thursday. Environmentalists praised the move but said the government must do more to curb the nation’s burgeoning production of greenhouse gases. President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono signed the decree on Monday to continue the 2011 moratorium, which barred [...]

The UN general Assembly condemned President Bashar al-Assad’s “escalation” of the Syrian war on Wednesday but Indonesia, along with 58 other nations, including Brazil, South Africa and India, abstained. After three years of civil war – and with the death toll topping 90,000 – leaders and envoys from world and regional powers are shuttling between [...]

Indonesian authorities blamed poor training for a crash in which a rookie pilot undershot the runway and landed in the sea off the resort island of Bali last month, according to a report. All 108 passengers and crew survived the spectacular April 13 crash, which split the new Boeing 737-800 in two and was a [...]

Rescuers have recovered one more body from a collapsed mine tunnel in eastern Indonesia, police said on Thursday, taking the death toll to five as search teams battled to reach 24 others still trapped. Ten workers have been rescued alive following the accident on Tuesday at US firm Freeport-McMoRan’s Grasberg, one of the world’s biggest [...]

Issuance of structured notes tied to Indonesia’s sovereign debt surged to the most in three years, led by JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM), as investors seek to capitalise on the second-highest yields among major Asian economies. Sales of notes linked to Indonesian government bonds jumped to the equivalent of $519.7 million this year through May [...]

Rescue work is continuing at a major US-owned gold and copper mine in Indonesia after a tunnel collapsed on Tuesday, trapping more than 20 workers. Police say four miners died and 10 others were evacuated after the tunnel caved in at Freeport’s Grasberg mine, in the eastern province of Papua. The situation at the mine [...]

Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc halted operations at the world’s second largest copper mine in Indonesia on Wednesday as rescue workers scrambled to find 25 workers caught underground in a tunnel collapse a day earlier. The head of Freeport Indonesia said he would travel to the remote West Papua site later on Wednesday to assess [...]

Wildlife researchers are pushing for a more cohesive effort between Malaysia and Indonesia to conserve the critically endangered Sumatran rhino. With fewer than 100 animals left in Sumatra and Borneo, scientists are proposing that the population be managed as a single conservation unit. The Sumatran rhino is found in Sumatra and possibly Kalimantan in Indonesia [...]

The death toll from an accident at a US-owned mine in remote eastern Indonesia rose to four on Wednesday, as rescuers struggled to reach 23 workers still trapped underground in a collapsed tunnel. Ten people have been rescued alive following the accident early Tuesday at Freeport-McMoRan’s Grasberg, one of the world’s biggest gold and copper [...]

Indonesia has extended a logging ban to protect rainforests despite fierce industry pressure, the government said Wednesday, but green groups slammed it as inadequate to safeguard threatened habitats. Vast tracts of the sprawling Indonesian archipelago are covered in trees, including some of the world’s most biodiverse tropical rainforest that is home to endangered animals such [...]

Two workers were killed and 31 others were trapped underground after a tunnel caved in Tuesday at a gold and copper mine in remote eastern Indonesia, its US operator said. The accident happened at Freeport-McMoRan’s huge Grasberg mine, and was the latest in a string of problems at the operation including a major 2011 strike [...]

Indonesia kept interest rates unchanged for a 15th consecutive meeting as the threat of inflation from planned fuel-price increases outweighs the risk of slowing growth. Bank Indonesia Governor Darmin Nasution and his board held the reference rate at a record-low 5.75 percent, the central bank said in Jakarta today. The decision was predicted by all [...]

An unknown number of workers at the Indonesian unit of Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc are trapped underground after a tunnel collapsed at the world’s second-largest copper mine, a statement from the Arizona-based firm said on Tuesday. Freeport Indonesia operates the Grasberg mine in west Papua province, which also has the world’s largest gold reserves [...]