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JAKARTA: An Indonesian court on Thursday jailed an Islamist militant with links to one of Asia's most notorious terror leaders for 10 years for recruiting people to militant-training camps. Badri Hartono led an extremist group called al-Qaida Indonesia and was found guilty of sending recruits to a militant camp on a jungle-clad island known as a terror hotbed. Hartono also provided shelter in 2009 to terror leader Noordin Mohammed Top, head of a violent splinter faction of the radical Jemaah Islamiyah network that carried out attacks on Western targets, prosecutors said. Hartono "recruited and sent people to Poso," judge Musa...

THE live export market suffers another blow, with a Queensland mission to Indonesia being told pre-slaughter cattle stunning won't be allowed. The trade mission, led by Agriculture Minister John McVeigh, was told there had been a marked shift against stunning by Indonesians, the Courier Mail reports. Stun guns - commonly used in Australian abattoirs - are the main hope of exporters wanting Indonesian abattoirs to overcome cruel slaughter conditions. The northern live cattle market is on its knees due to a decision taken by Indonesia in 2009 to wind back exports to start its own beef industry. Graziers - some...

JAKARTA - Driven by strong exports and buoyant domestic markets, Indonesia is projected to be among the world's top 10 economies by 2025. While the future looks bright for Southeast Asia's largest economy, a growing tide of religious intolerance threatens to undermine those gains. Where officials have in the past attributed religious violence and terrorism to foreign influenced groups, now the threats to stability are more clearly homegrown. In the late 1990s and 2000s Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) was the main threat in Indonesia. The radical group attacked foreign tourists in Bali in 2002 and 2005, the Australian embassy in Jakarta...

Indonesia could become a significant Asia power and counterweight to China. It is the world’s most populous Islamic nation but sports a tolerant reputation. Indonesians evicted the Suharto dictatorship and created a democratic and increasingly prosperous state. So far, the artificial country has successfully countered multiple secessionist pressures. Perhaps even more important, Indonesians could encourage Islam to move in a more liberal direction. Muslims make up nearly 90 percent of the population, but Indonesia’s politics traditionally have been secular. In its new report, “In Religion’s Name: Abuses Against Religious Minorities in Indonesia,” Human Rights Watch noted that “Indonesia is rightly...