January 24, 2018

By Phil Stewart

JAKARTA (Reuters) – U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis saw Indonesian troops drink snake blood, roll in glass, break bricks with their heads, walk on fire, and more, in a rare military demonstration on Wednesday meant to show the unique skills of Indonesia’s military.

Pentagon chiefs are accustomed to seeing foreign forces carry out more routine military demonstrations during foreign travel and, ahead of Wednesday’s event, the press traveling with Mattis was expecting a hostage rescue drill.

The ceremony at Indonesia’s armed forces headquarters was far more theatrical, however, even featuring a blindfolded soldier shoot out a balloon held between the legs of one of his colleagues. At least one shot missed, although no one appeared injured.

To the sounds of beating drums, the Indonesian soldiers performed a series of gripping martial arts techniques, breaking what appeared to be concrete bricks with their heads. They also smashed stacks of burning blocks with their hands.

Wearing a hood to blind him, one knife-wielding Indonesian soldier slashed away at a cucumber sticking out of his colleague’s mouth, coming just inches from striking his nose with the long blade.

Perhaps the highlight was a demonstration involving live snakes, which Indonesian forces brought out in bags and scattered on the ground, just feet from where Mattis was standing. That included a King Cobra, which widened its neck as it if were going to attack.

The soldiers then cut off the snake heads and fed the snake blood to each other, as the crowd looked on. At least one Indonesian soldier bit a snake in half.

At the end of the demonstration, to the tune of the movie “Mission Impossible,” the Indonesian forces carried out a hostage rescue operation, deploying stealthily from helicopters – with police dogs. The dogs intercepted the gunman.

“As you can see, the dogs bit the terrorist,” the narrator concluded.

Mattis appeared to enjoy the demonstration, which came at the end of a three-day visit to Indonesia, and spoke about how the Indonesian forces were smart to wear the snakes down before trying to handle them.

“The snakes! Did you see them tire them out and then grab them? The way they were whipping them around – a snake gets tired very quickly,” he told reporters as he flew to Vietnam.

Indonesian forces are active in jungle conditions and do have to deal with snakes at times.

The demonstration also showed the intensity of the training of Indonesian forces, Mattis said.

“You could imagine how much training went into each individual there, that they were able to do that,” he said. “When you watch a force do that, many small things, perfectly, you can imagine that they can also put the bigger things together.”

Some of the troops came from Kopassus, Indonesia’s elite special forces, a Pentagon spokesman said.

Indonesia hopes Mattis can restore closer U.S. military ties with Kopassus, which have faced restrictions under U.S. law over human rights abuses in the 1990s.

(Reporting by Phil Stewart; Editing by Nick Macfie and Clarence Fernandez)

January 25, 2018

JAKARTA (Reuters) – Nearly 90 percent of Indonesians who understand the term LGBT feel “threatened” by the community and believe their religion forbids same-sex relations, a survey showed on Thursday.

Homosexuality is not regulated by law in Indonesia, except in Aceh province where Islamic law bans same-sex relations. But the world’s largest Muslim-majority nation has seen a rise in hostility toward the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community, with activists saying their rights are not being adequately protected by the state.

“The survey finds that, generally, the Indonesian public views the LGBT (community) negatively,” the Saiful Mujani Research Centre said on its website.

“But the public is also of the view that the LGBT community has the right to live in Indonesia and that the government should protect them like other citizens.”

There are sizeable minorities of Christians, Hindus, and those who adhere to native beliefs among Indonesia’s 250 million people.

Indonesian police have over the last few years stepped up raids targeting “spas” or what they call “gay sex parties” and charged many of those involved with violating strict pornography laws.

This has raised alarm bells among rights activists who say the law is being used to unfairly target LGBT individuals. More than 300 people were arrested in 2017 for alleged LGBT-behaviour, according to Human Rights Watch.

“The police should stop criminalizing LGBT individuals and… instead protect them principally in their private spaces from harassment and intimidation,” said Andreas Harsono of Human Rights Watch.

The Constitutional Court last month struck down a petition by a conservative group to ban all consensual extramarital sex including same-sex relations. But the group intends to lobby parliament as politicians deliberate revisions to the criminal code.

The pollster surveyed a total of 1,220 people of various religious backgrounds across Indonesia between March 2016 and December 2017 and found that 87 percent of them considered the LGBT community a “threat to private or public life”.

A similar proportion of people in the survey disagreed that an LGBT individual should be able to hold a leading public office, and said that they believed their religion prohibited LGBT activity.

The survey also found that around half the respondents did not know the meaning of the term “LGBT”, which was used in all survey questions. The results were based on those who did.

Half of those who were aware of the term said the government should protect the LGBT community. A Pew Research Center survey found in 2013 that around 93 percent of Indonesians believed society should not accept homosexuality.

(Reporting and writing by Kanupriya Kapoor; Editing by Ed Davies and Nick Macfie)

January 29, 2018

By Anshuman Daga

SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Google has made its first ride-hailing investment in Asia by pumping money into Go-Jek, as the Indonesian start-up and deep-pocketed rivals rapidly expand their app-based services and digital payments in Southeast Asia.

The funding deepens Google’s commitment to Indonesia’s internet economy,” Caesar Sengupta, a vice president at Google said in a company blog on Monday. http://bit.ly/2nmqPAf

The announcement by Alphabet Inc’s Google comes two weeks after sources told Reuters that Google and Singapore state investor Temasek were among those investing in Go-Jek as part of a $1.2 billion fundraising round.

Rivals Grab and Uber are backed by Japan’s SoftBank Group, while Go-Jek has secured investments from Chinese technology giants Tencent Holdings Ltd and JD.com Inc.

Google’s blog did not specify how much Google is investing but two sources had told Reuters that Google was investing about $100 million.

Ride hailing firms are investing tens of millions of dollars to expand their digital payment systems and are also seeking to allow their users to pay for third-party services.

With more than 133 million people online, Indonesia is home to the fifth largest population of internet users in the world but half of the country’s population has yet to connect to the internet, Google’s Sengupta said.

Both Grab and Uber are expanding in Go-Jek’s home market, which is Southeast Asia’s most populous country and where locals are keen to lap up an array of mobile-based services. Southeast Asia is the world’s third-biggest ride-hailing market after China and the United States.

Go-Jek, a play on the local word for motorbike taxis, delivers everything from meals and groceries to cleaners, masseuses and hairdressers across Indonesia’s capital city Jakarta, all at the touch of a smartphone app.

The company, which began as a ride-hailing app for motorcycle taxis, was set up by Nadiem Makarim, a graduate of the Harvard School of Business and a former associate with McKinsey, who has quickly become a poster child for start-up success in Indonesia.

(Reporting by Anshuman Daga; Editing by Edwina Gibbs and Muralikumar Anantharaman)

January 29, 2018

By Marc Jones and Fanny Potkin

LONDON (Reuters) – The United States needs to resist protectionist trade measures that could “ruin the world” and destroy progress made in reducing global poverty, Indonesia’s finance minister said on Monday.

Sri Mulyani Indrawati told Reuters she remained optimistic recent U.S. tariffs affecting other major Asian economies would not turn into a tit-for-tat trade war as open trade had been the big driver in reducing poverty over the last 30 years.

“That is why you don’t want to ruin the world,” Indrawati said about U.S. protectionism.

“It could be one or two practices you want to correct, but don’t destroy the achievement that is already remarkable – and that is good for the United States and good for the world.”

She also commented on the dollar’s decline. The world’s dominant currency is its biggest slide since 2010-2011 and its fall accelerated last week when U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin said the weakness had its advantages.

“The U.S. dollar, should be reflecting the fundamentals of their economy. It’s not going to be a tool to boosting of their competitiveness,” Indrawati said.

Referring back to the issue of trade protectionism she added: “We are hoping, as President Trump said, that ‘America First’ does not mean America alone.”

About 16 percent of Indonesia’s trade is directly with the United States, though it also has an indirect exposure through other trading partners like nearby Singapore and Japan.

Indrawati was in London to help launch the second “komodo” bond, a rupiah denominated bond sold in international debt markets rather than in Jakarta and named after the large, aggressive lizard found only in Indonesia.

This one was from state-owned infrastructure and procurement firm, Wijaya Karya, which raised 5.4 trillion rupiah ($404.13 million) as part of the government’s plans to get its firms to broaden their sources of financing.

Two more state owned enterprises are expected to follow but Jakarta is also a drive to make them more profitable and ensure they do not overstretch themselves by taking on too many large projects, which also crowds out private firms.

The minister said the government was bringing in new rules which will prevent state owned enterprises or their subsidiaries bidding on any infrastructure project contract worth under $40 million.

She added that Indonesia was working toward a U.S. dollar-denominated “Green”, sukuk bond.

“I think it is very good feedback from bond investors and when the time is right we will bring the issue with the right size as well as the right structure.”

Asked whether it was imminent, she replied. “We’ll see, we’ll see.”

($1 = 13,362.0000 rupiah)

(Reporting by Marc Jones & Fanny Potkin; Editing by Angus MacSwan)

January 30, 2018

By Fransiska Nangoy and Tabita Diela

JAKARTA (Reuters) – Fintech firms, offering loans of as little as a few hundred dollars, are seeing a spike in lending in Indonesia where tens of millions of people have little or no access to bank credit – helping alleviate a financing shortfall estimated at more than $73 billion.

The emergence of these peer-to-peer (P2P) lending platforms has so far been welcomed by Indonesia’s financial regulators which see them as offering a much needed service to cash-strapped businesses and consumers at a time when Southeast Asia’s biggest economy has been hobbled by sluggish bank lending.

Wimboh Santoso, head of Indonesia’s financial regulator (OJK), said while the trend was still a drop in the ocean of overall lending, more than 250,000 people had taken out loans through fintech. Around 30 P2P firms had extended 2.6 trillion rupiah ($193.8 million) in lending as of January 2018, compared with just 247 billion rupiah of lending in December 2016. Another 36 more firms were waiting to be approved, he added.

P2P lending has helped small businesses access capital.

“It is so flexible. I don’t need collateral and I can submit my documents anytime of the day. There’s no bank like that,” said Siyono, a 51-year-old business owner in Jakarta, who stumbled on a P2P platform while browsing on his smartphone and took out a loan at around 16 percent annual interest.

Bank loan penetration in Indonesia, where only one in three adults have bank accounts, was around 34 percent of GDP in 2015, among the lowest of Asia Pacific countries. Loan growth has also fallen below 10 percent since the start of 2016, compared with more than 20 percent during the commodity boom years before that.

While P2P platforms will help Indonesia progress toward a digital economy, some analysts warn that a more accurate credit assessment process must be developed.

“Prudential principles that have been implemented by banks, have to be implemented by these firms too. They may have to be even more prudent, since the credit histories of their borrowers are unknown,” said Damhuri Nasution, an analyst with Danareksa Research Institute in Jakarta.

SMARTPHONES BOOST

Soaring smartphone ownership, with more than 100 million smartphones sold in the country of around 250 million people, has fueled the growth of P2P.

Financing demand had been “beyond expectation”, said Reynold Wijaya, co-founder and chief executive of Sequoia Capital-backed ModalKu, which has distributed more than 540 billion rupiah in financing to SMEs in Indonesia within two years of operation.

ModalKu accepts less than a fifth of loan applicants to curb the risk of fraud or default.

“The biggest reason for default in Indonesia is actually not credit risks, but mostly fraud,” said Wijaya.

OJK also wants P2P operators to expand financing to Indonesia’s 40 million farmers.

“Agriculture is still also a segment that is underserved and a lot of them have to rely on ‘tengkulak’, and we’d like to change that,” said Benedicto Haryono, chief executive of KoinWorks, referring to middlemen who buy farmers’ produce and give out short-term loans, often at high interest rates.

Koinworks, which aims to lift financing six- to seven-fold this year, is launching pilot agriculture loans this year, and Haryono said this could give farmers a credit history and make them more bankable.

Such platforms can also tap overseas funding. KoinWorks, where the minimum amount users can lend is 100,000 rupiah ($7.50), obtains funding from countries such as Germany, Singapore and Australia.

Nurhaida, deputy chairman of OJK, told reporters the regulator is working on a roadmap to “regulate and facilitate fintech development”.

Operators, however, hope that any new rules will not be too onerous.

“We are still start-ups, we can’t be too strictly regulated just yet,” said ModalKu’s Wijaya.

(Additional reporting by Cindy Silviana; Editing by Ed Davies and Jacqueline Wong)

February 2, 2018

BANDA ACEH, Indonesia (Reuters) – Indonesia’s national police chief has ordered an investigation into the detention of 12 transgender women in the province of Aceh, officials said on Friday, after reports that they were stripped, beaten and forced to cut their hair before being released without charge.

Indonesia has the world’s largest Muslim population but Aceh, on the northern tip of Sumatra, is the only province that enforces Islamic law and outlaws homosexuality.

Religious police and vigilantes in the ultra-conservative province often raid homes and places of work and detain people on suspicion of engaging in homosexual activity.

Police in North Aceh raided hair salons – where transgender people often work – last weekend and briefly detained 12 individuals. Rights activists and media reports said they were forced to cut their hair and were stripped and beaten.

“There were photos circulated that led us to suspect that there had been physical action taken against the suspects,” Misbahul Munauwar, a spokesman for Aceh police, said. “The national police chief has instructed us to investigate those photos and to determine if there was any…procedural or ethical violation.”

A national police spokesman confirmed that police chief Tito Karnavian had ordered the investigation.

Human Rights Watch and other rights groups welcomed the move, which comes amid a rising tide of hostility against the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community.

Police in Aceh and elsewhere have stepped up raids on what they call “gay spas” and “gay sex parties” in recent months, detaining people on charges of violating strict anti-pornography laws.

Dozens of protesters on Friday staged an anti-LGBT rally outside a mosque in the provincial capital Banda Aceh.

“We don’t hate gay, bisexual or transgender people. What we hate is their actions, and if we can prove their actions, they will be punished,” Aceh governor Irwandi Yusuf told the small crowd.

Last year, the provincial and central governments drew international condemnation after authorities in Aceh tried two young men on charges of engaging in gay sex and then publicly caned them – the first such case in the country.

Indonesia’s parliament is also drafting revisions to the national criminal code that could ban all consensual sex outside marriage.

The parliamentary commission drawing up recommendations has still to finalize its proposals, but a draft seen by Reuters includes measures to criminalize extramarital sex, same-sex relations and co-habitation, all of which were previously unregulated. [nL4N1PO3OW]

(Reporting by Reuters stringer in Banda Aceh; Writing by Kanupriya Kapoor; Editing by Ed Davies and Nick Macfie)

February 6, 2018

JAKARTA (Reuters) – A measles and malnutrition crisis that killed dozens of children in Indonesia’s impoverished province of Papua over the past few months is under control, the health ministry said on Tuesday.

At least 72 people, mostly children, died from complications of malnutrition and measles in Asmat, a remote area of the country’s easternmost province. The outbreak prompted health authorities to send in military paramedics and aid and declare an “extraordinary outbreak” on Jan. 15.

“We have withdrawn the ‘extraordinary outbreak’ status because the trend of affected people is declining,” Asmat chief Elisa Kambu said in a statement published on the health ministry website.

Around 650 children have contracted measles and at least 223 are suffering from malnutrition. More than 17,300 children have been immunized, the statement added.

“We still need support in Asmat, nurses and doctors,” Kambu said.

Some activists and Papuans have blamed the health crisis on neglect by the central government. Papua is one of Indonesia’s poorest areas and President Joko Widodo, after coming to power in 2014, pledged to speed up its development.

(Reporting by Kanupriya Kapoor; Editing by Nick Macfie)

February 6, 2018

SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Nissan Motor Co <7201.T> said on Tuesday it will launch the new version of its all-electric vehicle Leaf in seven markets in Asia-Pacific, and explore bringing it to two more, in its latest push to boost sales of electrified vehicles.

Lower-emission vehicles have become a major priority for the world’s top automakers, who are poised to introduce dozens of new battery electric and hybrid gasoline-electric models over the next five years.

Nissan, Japan’s No. 2 automaker, will launch the model in Australia, Hong Kong, Malaysia, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea and Thailand during the next fiscal year, and also explore introducing it in Indonesia and the Philippines.

The company is also looking at the option of bringing vehicles based on its “e-Power” gasoline hybrid technology to Southeast Asia.

“We are seriously planning. I want to find some good chance to announce some concrete timing in the market,” Yutaka Sanada, Nissan’s regional head, said when asked about the company’s plans for “e-Power” technology in Southeast Asia.

He said the technology was a “very good bridge” to attract car buyers to try electric vehicles as it gave the experience of driving an electric car, but did not require charging stations.

Currently, electric cars account for a small portion of the market in Southeast Asia, due to low affordability and the lack of charging infrastructure.

For example, the share of hybrid and electric vehicles in 2017 was less than 2 percent in Thailand and 0.4 percent in Indonesia compared with Japan’s 27.3 percent, data from LMC Automotive shows.

Sanada said that while there were no immediate plans to produce electric vehicles in Southeast Asia, Nissan would consider local manufacturing depending on market growth.

“Once regional demand is to some size, of course in order to keep efficiency, we consider local production. It is normal for all manufacturers,” said Sanada, a regional senior vice president at Nissan.

He said the company was discussing a number of ideas, including the expansion of charging stations, with the government in Thailand, which is offering incentives to car manufacturers to localize.

Such discussions included potentially manufacturing electric vehicles and batteries in the country, but there were no concrete plans yet, Sanada said.

(Reporting by Aradhana AravindanEditing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)

February 7, 2018

By Kanupriya Kapoor

JAKARTA (Reuters) – The United Nations human rights chief on Wednesday criticized proposals in Indonesia’s parliament to criminalize gay sex and extramarital sex, saying such laws could hurt the country’s beleaguered LGBT community and other minorities.

Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein said he had raised the issue with President Joko Widodo during a three-day visit to the world’s largest Muslim-majority country, where hostility toward the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community has risen sharply in recent years.

“Discussions of (revisions to the criminal code) betray strains of intolerance seemingly alien to Indonesian culture that have made inroads here,” Zeid told a news briefing, adding that he believed the proposed rules were “discriminatory”.

“The hateful rhetoric against the LGBT community that is being cultivated seemingly for cynical political purposes will only deepen their suffering and create unnecessary divisions,” he said.

Indonesia’s parliament is currently deliberating revisions to a Dutch colonial-era criminal code, including proposals to outlaw sex outside marriage, same-sex relations, and co-habitation, all of which were previously unregulated by law.

The revisions have broad support in parliament, where few politicians have stood up for LGBT rights for fear of alienating a largely conservative voter base ahead of legislative and presidential elections next year.

Many officials in President Widodo’s government have said LGBT people, like other citizens, should be free from discrimination and violence. But top officials, including the president, have said that Indonesia’s cultural and religious norms do not accept the LGBT movement.

Activists have raised concerns that, if approved, the new rules could violate basic rights and be misused to target minorities.

Currently, Indonesian law does not regulate homosexuality, except in the ultra-conservative Islamic province of Aceh.

Zeid, a member of the Jordanian royal family who has been in the U.N. post since 2014, said Indonesia was among the most progressive states in Southeast Asia on human rights.

But he also urged Jakarta to address past atrocities – like the 1965 massacre of nearly half a million suspected communists, – and human rights abuses in the easternmost province of Papua, and the use of the death penalty.

“There are some dark clouds on the horizon but … I hope the common sense and strong tradition of tolerance of the Indonesian people will prevail over populism and political opportunism,” he said.

(Reporting by Kanupriya KapoorEditing by Ed Davies and Christopher Cushing)

February 8, 2018

JAKARTA (Reuters) – Bank Indonesia (BI) will manage the rupiah currency to reflect economic fundamentals while still maintaining market mechanisms, senior deputy governor Mirza Adityaswara told an economic forum on Thursday.

The rupiah touched its weakest since October 27 on Thursday. It has dropped around 1.7 percent since the end of January amid the global equity sell-off. [EMRG/FRX]

BI governor Agus Martowardojo said earlier this week that the rupiah’s movements this year had been within a “fair” range.

(Reporting by Maikel Jefriando; Editing by Eric Meijer)

February 9, 2018

By Vidya Ranganathan

SINGAPORE (Reuters) – If this week’s selloff in global equity markets is any guide, then Asia’s frothy debt and stock markets have reason to be on edge over the steady rise in long-term U.S. bond yields that could push up global funding costs and drive capital out of the region.

A whiff of inflation in the United States sent global stock markets tumbling in the past week, wiping 7 percent off Asian equities, despite a still supportive backdrop of robust global growth, a weak dollar and rising company earnings.

Bond and currency markets were relatively unaffected, as they have been through the Federal Reserve’s slow pace of policy rate rises since 2015 and more recent reminders from central banks in Europe and Japan about dialing down on stimulus.

So far, long-term dollar yields have also stayed low, keeping a lid on funding costs for investors who have pumped billions of dollars into high-yielding emerging market assets.

But U.S. 10-year Treasury yields are creeping closer to 3 percent, where analysts say the current “Goldilocks” scenario of a strong economy and muted inflation would give way to fears of peaking growth, rising inflation and more rapid policy tightening.

“Our concept of Goldilocks is around a pretty modest rise in U.S. yields,” said Daniel Morris, a senior investment strategist at BNP Paribas Asset Management. “A rise to 3 percent or so wouldn’t be quite so benign. That would upset this Goldilocks view.”

Ten-year Treasury yields were falling through most of 2017 even as short-term dollar rates climbed. They spiked above 2.8 percent for the first time in 3 years last week, and have risen 50 basis points since November.

Investors would read a 3 percent mark on 10-year Treasuries as a situation in which U.S. inflation is accelerating, the Fed would have to raise rates faster and markets globally would be jolted, Morris said.

Complicating matters is the U.S. dollar, which has steadied this month after 13 months of a slow grind lower. The weaker dollar had provided foreign investors an added reason to stay invested in the appreciating Asian currencies.

“Emerging markets have become much more sensitive to the long end than the short end of the U.S. yield curve,” said Frederic Neumann, co-head of Asian economic research at HSBC.

That was primarily because much of the money that has flowed into Asia since the global financial crisis a decade ago is real money whose funding costs are based on long-term yields, rather than investors loaded up on short-term leverage, he said.

“So if you have the U.S. 10-year at 2.3 percent, it still makes sense to invest your money in Indonesia. If the 10-year trades at 3.3 percent, the investment in emerging markets will probably need to be repriced.”

NOT ANOTHER TAPER TANTRUM

The five markets of Indonesia, Malaysia, South Korea, Thailand and India received net bond inflows of around $49 billion in 2017, while the flows to seven of the biggest emerging Asian stock markets were less than half that amount.

So far these bond markets aren’t pricing in any major monetary tightening by local authorities, hence most of them are not too correlated to U.S. yields. Even yields on dollar-denominated bonds issued in Asia have been capped by narrowing spreads over Treasury yields.

Investors in some markets will have more cushion as U.S. yields rise, such as those in Indonesia’s 10-year bonds that fetch 6.4 percent and India’s at 7.5 percent. The more vulnerable are those in markets where 10-year yields are about the same as U.S. Treasuries, such as South Korea and Thailand.

As Treasury yields rise, emerging market investors will be forced to assess whether they are simply being compensated for the higher inflation or being paid to take on additional risk, said Maurice Meijers, CEO for Singapore at Robeco Institutional Asset Management.

“A lot of market participants are not pricing in risk in their search for yield. Once Treasury yields rise dramatically, that would hurt things from a sentiment perspective,” Meijers said.

Most fund managers think a slow grind higher in U.S. yields may cause less pain for emerging markets, at least far less than the turmoil during the 2013 taper tantrum, when the Fed first dropped hints of reducing its crisis-era stimulus.

Still, they worry that investors are complacent.

Alain Bokobza, head of asset allocation at Societe Generale, said investors should “prepare for the end of Goldilocks.”

“At 2.9-3.0 percent on the 10-year Treasury, global markets and emerging markets would start to be really worried,” he said, describing that level as a threshold at which there would be worries about destabilization in the United States possibly causing an attack on the U.S. bond markets, and raising big questions about the sustainability of U.S. growth without inflation.

(Editing by Jacqueline Wong)

February 10, 2018

By Kanupriya Kapoor and Agustinus Beo Da Costa

JAKARTA (Reuters) – Zulfikar Fahd, an openly gay man, says he flew from Indonesia to Canada late last month and claimed asylum on grounds that he faced discrimination and persecution in his home country, which is poised to criminalise same-sex relations and consensual sex outside marriage. 

Fahd, 30, who had worked in public relations, said he had already given up hope that the police would provide him protection against Islamic fundamentalists who have fomented hostility towards the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community in this Muslim-majority country, which is also the world’s third-largest democracy.

Police have stood by while vigilantes have stormed “gay sex parties”, and have themselves broken up gatherings at spas and hostels, charging some with violating strict pornography laws, and prompting many others to go underground. The authorities have also been clamping down online, blocking many LGBT sites or getting LGBT apps removed by host companies, including dating apps.

Until now, homosexuality has not been regulated by law in Indonesia, except in the ultra-conservative Aceh province where Islamic law bans same-sex relations.

But as lawmakers look to shore up conservative votes ahead of elections, parliament appears on the verge of revising the national criminal code to impose restrictions on same-sex relations and consensual sex between men and women outside marriage.

PRISON SENTENCES

Various drafts of the criminal code have appeared. The latest, though not necessarily the final one, seeks the prosecution of same-sex relations if an act is carried out in public, if there is evidence of abuse, or if a minor is involved.

Unmarried co-habiting couples or those engaging in extramarital sex could be prosecuted only if there is a complaint from a close relative.  

Adultery is already a crime in Indonesia.

Under the proposals, those found guilty of a public act of gay sex could be sentenced to up to 18 months in prison, and up to nine years if there is evidence of abuse or video of the act is published. Heterosexual couples found living together without being married could face up to six months in prison, and two years if engaging in sex outside marriage.

Rights activists say the proposed rules could breach basic rights like privacy and could be subject to interpretation by vigilantes, the police and courts so that a party in someone’s home could be deemed a public event.    

“The police are not doing anything to protect us. In fact, they stand by and let things happen, almost as if they have a deal with the conservatives and vigilantes,” Fahd told Reuters by phone from Ottawa. “If they enact this new law, this kind of vigilantism will be out of control.”   

Fahd says he has been granted temporary residency in Canada and has a final immigration hearing in May.

Cases before Canada’s Refugee Protection Division, where all refugee claims in the country are initially adjudicated, are private, said Immigration and Refugee Board spokeswoman Anna Pape.

RELOCATE TO THAILAND?

Concord Consulting, a Jakarta-based risk consultancy, said in a recent report that Indonesia has much to lose from allowing homophobic attitudes to take hold of society, including potentially foreign investment, donor assistance, and vital tourism earnings.

Travel websites aimed at LGBT holidaymakers indicate the gay scene remains vibrant on the resort island of Bali, the cornerstone of Indonesia’s tourism industry. But some in the industry fear the new rules could deter gay travellers.

“It will probably force them to go to places like Thailand instead of coming to Bali,” said the owner of a Bali guesthouse that caters to LGBT tourists. The foreign owner, who declined to be identified due to the sensitivity of the matter, said he would try to relocate his business to Thailand.

Thailand, a predominantly Buddhist country, is home to a liberal LGBT scene and has launched marketing campaigns aimed at attracting gay tourists. The Tourism Authority of Thailand has a gothaibefree.com website aimed at LGBT travellers. It says the Thai people are tolerant and respectful of the LGBT community and also offers discounts for hotels and spas.  

In Indonesia that is far from the approach. A parliamentary commission drawing up changes to the Dutch colonial-era criminal code has been consulting with the public and taking the opinions of religious scholars, legal experts, and rights groups.

Its deliberations come against a backdrop of rising anti-LGBT rhetoric, including from senior officials, and a string of vigilante and police raids on places where gay people have gathered.

“MENTAL ILLNESS”

A recent survey found that nearly 90 percent of Indonesians who understand the term ‘LGBT’ feel threatened by the community, while the Indonesian Psychiatric Association and the Health Ministry state in internal documents seen by Reuters that being LGBT is a mental illness.

Defence Minister Ryamizard Ryacudu has branded homosexuality a national security threat on the basis that it “is a kind of modern warfare that undermines the country’s sovereignty”.

Last month, 12 transgender women in Aceh were detained by police and forced to cut their hair and dress in ‘masculine’ clothes, sparking outrage from rights groups.

Most political parties support the changes being proposed, particularly those that outlaw gay sex.

“If someone dares to disagree, does that person want to risk not being elected again?” said Arsul Sani, a lawmaker from the United Development Party, an Islamic party, who has been involved in drafting revisions to the law.

Most Indonesians adhere to a moderate form of Islam under an officially secular system, but there has been a rise of hardline, politicized Islam in recent years, and it has moved from the fringe to the centre of politics.

Islamist groups led mass rallies last year to unseat the then governor of Jakarta, a Christian. Basuki Tjahaja Purnama had said political rivals were deceiving people by using a verse in the Koran to say Muslims should not be led by a non-Muslim. He apologised for the comments, but was later jailed for two years for blasphemy.

Critics say the creeping Islamisation of politics is fostering moral conservatism as Indonesia heads into crucial provincial polls in June and a presidential election in 2019.  

“The hateful rhetoric against (the LGBT) community that is being cultivated seemingly for cynical political purposes will only deepen their suffering and create unnecessary divisions,” U.N. human rights chief Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein said when visiting Indonesia this week. He said he raised the issue with President Joko Widodo.

SOME DISSENTING VOICES

There are some dissenting voices as the legislative revisions are nudged forward, among them parliament deputy speaker Fahri Hamzah, who has been lobbying lawmakers and the government to apply the brakes.

“I’m warning them on the dangers of criminalisation of our privacy too much. It endangers our future, our freedom and also our economy,” he told Reuters.

“You don’t regulate the bedroom of the people.”

He accused Widodo of being “weak on the issue” and, instead of speaking up, relying on the lobbying of liberal media and non-governmental organisations.   

Top officials, including the president, have said that while LGBT people should not face discrimination, Indonesia’s cultural and religious norms do not accept the LGBT movement.

A presidential spokesman declined to comment, but a government representative involved in the deliberations said efforts were underway to protect privacy.

“The state cannot enter the private realm. It can only get involved if what people do disturbs public order,” said Enny Nurbaningsih of the law and human rights ministry.  

Fahd, who is originally from East Java, says he has lost faith in the protection promised to the nation’s people in the Indonesian constitution. “I want the Indonesian government to see that we have our voice. It’s like I’m saying to them, ‘I don’t need you: there are other countries that accept me for who I am.'” 

(Additional reporting by Ed Davies, Tom Allard, and Andrew Mangelsdorf and Amy Sawitta Lefevre in BANGKOK and Anna Mehler Paperny in TORONTO.Writing by John Chalmers; Editing by Martin Howell)

February 19, 2018

By Ed Davies and Cindy Silviana

JAKARTA (Reuters) – Indonesia is likely to have more than five startups worth at least $1 billion each by 2019, with healthcare and education the most promising sectors to spawn new unicorns in Southeast Asia’s biggest economy, the communications minister told Reuters.

Driven by a youthful population of more than 250 million people owning at least 100 million smartphones, Indonesia has seen a rapid growth in the number of startups trying to capitalize on this potential in a growing economy.

The country currently has four unicorns – companies that have reached $1 billion in valuation without tapping the stock markets – including ride-hailing company Go-Jek, travel site Traveloka, and market places Bukalapak and Tokopedia.

“In ASEAN (the Association of Southeast Asian Nations) we have seven unicorns and, out of seven, four are coming from Indonesia,” said Minister of Communication and Information Rudiantara, noting that even one of the unicorns in the region outside Indonesia derived most of its revenue from the country.

“I believe that we’ll have more than five unicorns until 2019,” Rudiantara, who uses one name, said in an interview.

Investors in Go-Jek include Tencent Holdings <0700.HK>, with Alphabet Inc’s <GOOGL.O> Google joining the latest fundraising. Tokopedia has backing from Alibaba <BABA.N> and SoftBank Group <9984.T>, while Traveloka’s backers include Expedia <EXPE.O> and JD.com <JD.O>. Bukalapak investors include Singapore’s GREE Ventures.

The minister said that a unicorn was likely to come from the education sector.

“If we see the numbers, I project that has to come from the education (sector),” he said.

Under Indonesia’s constitution, the government has to spend a fifth of its annual budget on education, so even excluding private spending an app or startup only needed to get a small percentage of this “huge” potential, he said.

Indonesia’s state budget for education was 400 trillion rupiah ($29.50 billion) in 2017.

The minister said the biggest local app for education currently was Ruanguru.

The other most promising sector to develop a unicorn is healthcare, which has a state budget of more than 100 trillion rupiah, he said.

He noted the development of startups like HaloDoc offering online medical consultation, while others include Alodokter.

On funding, the minister said that he wanted to help make it easier for unicorns to apply for initial public offerings in Indonesia. Local regulations prevent listings before companies have made a profit for a number of years.

“If necessary, I will go to the OJK (financial regulator) to solve this issue,” he said, adding the government should no longer be just a regulator.

“It’s an old model. The government has to be the facilitator,” said Rudiantara.

($1 = 13,558.0000 rupiah)

(Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)

February 20, 2018

JAKARTA (Reuters) – Indonesia suspended on Tuesday the construction of elevated infrastructure projects, including rail and roads, after a series of accidents raised questions about the safety of a government drive to upgrade transport networks.

Minister of Public Works and Housing Basuki Hadimuljono, who is in charge of infrastructure construction, said the government would suspend all construction of elevated infrastructure.

“Design, equipments and standard operating procedures will be evaluated. Everything will be evaluated,” he said, adding that President Joko Widodo had requested the action.

When Widodo came to power in 2014 he outlined a need for $450 billion investment in infrastructure by 2019 to help cut high logistics costs holding back Southeast Asia’s biggest economy.

Under the drive, a series of projects ranging from a subway in traffic-clogged Jakarta to seven new airports and thousands of kilometers of roads are being built, often by state-owned enterprises.

“We hope with such supervision, any negligence, errors in erecting such components that support the constructions are fully supervised one by one,” Widodo said on Tuesday.

There have been 14 accidents in the past six months, Hadimuljono said.

In the latest, a girder collapsed at a toll-road construction site in Jakarta on Tuesday injuring seven workers, media reported.

This month, a crane collapsed at an elevated railway project in another part of Jakarta, killing four people and injuring five.

Arie Setiadi Moerwanto, a director general at the ministry, said “a lot” of infrastructure would be suspended although he said it should not disrupt government infrastructure development targets.

Moerwanto said the length of suspensions would depend on the result of evaluations, but it could range up to a month.

The opposition Gerindra party criticized Widodo’s infrastructure push, likening it to forced-labor in colonial times.

“People’s lives are not being respected because what is most important is that the project must be completed on time. If in colonial times, workers were slow, they were whipped. In today’s era, slow workers are fired,” Gerindra said on Twitter.

“Gerindra urges workers working on these projects to be careful so they don’t become the next victims. And the public using these infrastructure projects should also be careful.”

(Reporting by Cindy Silviana and Maikel Jefriando; Additional reporting Kanupriya Kapoor; Writing by Fransiska Nangoy)

February 20, 2018

JAKARTA (Reuters) – Indonesia seized a record 1.6 tonnes of crystal methamphetamine from a ship off the northern island of Batam on Tuesday, a narcotics official said, the second major drug bust this month.

President Joko Widodo’s government has cracked down on trafficking in an effort to contain soaring consumption of crystal meth and other narcotics. But there has been no bloody war on drugs as in the neighboring Philippines, where thousands of people have been killed in anti-drugs operations.

Indonesia has among the world’s strictest anti-narcotics laws and drug trafficking is punishable by death.

“It’s an estimated 1.6 tonnes and yes, this is a record seizure for us,” said Sulistiandriatmoko, adding that details of its origin and destination were still under investigation.

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) estimates that Southeast Asia’s trade in methamphetamines and heroin was worth $31 billion in 2013.

Earlier this month, Indonesian authorities confiscated just over 1 ton of crystal meth, known locally as ‘shabu-shabu’, also in Batam, a small industrial hub a short ferry ride from Singapore.

Budi Waseso, head of the anti-narcotics agency, said authorities had acted on a tip from Chinese and Thai authorities and that the shipment had come from Myanmar in a vessel disguised as a fishing boat.

“It had been to Australia…and in and out of Indonesian waters several times. This means this ship had repeatedly entered Indonesia carrying large quantities of narcotics,” Waseso said.

Myanmar is part of the so-called Golden Triangle where it meets Thailand and Laos and where drug production and trafficking is booming.

(Reporting by Jessica Damiana and Kanupriya Kapoor; Writing by Kanupriya Kapoor; Editing by Nick Macfie)

February 26, 2018

By Anshuman Daga

SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Indonesia’s Go-Jek has raised a higher than targeted $1.5 billion in a fundraising round from a dozen investors including BlackRock and Google, sources said, as the ride-hailing firm builds its war chest to fight deep-pocketed rivals.

Go-Jek had planned last year to raise $1.2 billion, and, with the 25 percent extra funds it has received, it is now valued at about $5 billion, according to the sources.

Reuters Breakingviews said last month Go-Jek was valued at roughly $4 billion compared to over $6 billion for Grab, Southeast Asia’s largest ride-hailing firm.

The additional funds and backing of well-known investors including Singapore’s Temasek Holdings [TEM.UL] and Chinese technology giant Tencent Holdings will help Go-Jek to better compete in Southeast Asia’s cut-throat market where incentives to drivers and passengers are used to build loyalty.

Singapore-based Grab was expected to have raised $2.5 billion last year and Uber Technologies [UBER.UL] has pledged to invest aggressively in Southeast Asia – home to 640 million people – even though the U.S. firm expects to lose money in the fast growing market due to costly battles with rivals.

Both companies are expanding in Indonesia, Southeast Asia’s most populous country, where Go-Jek, a play on the local word for motorbike taxis, is transforming the local economy, economists say.

Go-Jek and Grab are also investing heavily in expanding their mobile payments platform.

“Go-Jek is far beyond a ride-hailing app, it’s a digital platform that dominates consumers’ daily lives, including transportation, food delivery, logistics, and payment, etc,” said Xiaofeng Wang, senior analyst at consultancy Forrester.

“That’s also the key value that its key investors like Google and Tencent see. They know well about the power of the digital ecosystem, and Go-Jek has built it in Indonesia, like Google in the U.S. and WeChat in China,” Wang said.

Go-Jek told Reuters that some investments that came in this year were part of the funding round that kicked off last year but it declined to comment on the amount raised or the names of investors.

It said the funding was aimed at developing technology for micro, small and medium enterprises in Indonesia.

Go-Jek delivers everything from meals and groceries to cleaners, masseuses and hairdressers across Indonesia’s capital city Jakarta, all at the touch of a smartphone app – helping it become a crucial workaround in a city with some of the worst traffic in the world.

Sources said BlackRock and Temasek are investing about $100 million each in Go-Jek’s latest fundraising.

BlackRock declined to comment. A Temasek spokesman confirmed participation in the fundraising but declined to say how much it had invested.

This month, Indonesian conglomerate Astra International said it will invest $150 million in Go-Jek, while sources said Djarum Group’s PT Global Digital Niaga is putting in $100 million.

Go-Jek’s payment system, known as Go-Pay, has emerged as one of the most popular mobile payment platforms in Indonesia. Grab, which bought Indonesian payment service Kudo last year, also sees its future in mobile payments as much as in transport.

Go-Jek is expanding in other Indonesian cities and has said it plans to start operations in the Philippines this year, followed by other Southeast Asian countries.

(Reporting by Anshuman Daga; Additional reporting by Cindy Silviana in JAKARTAEditing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)

March 1, 2018

By David Lawder

YOGYAKARTA, Indonesia (Reuters) – International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde said she saw positive and negative effects from a “complicated” U.S. tax overhaul, including a near-term growth bump that risks overheating the U.S. economy and a problematic rise in debt.

Lagarde told Reuters in an interview on Thursday that tax cuts can lift the U.S. growth rate by about 1.2 percentage points over the three years through 2020, which should help boost global growth and trade for at least a few years.

“To the extent that growth is higher in the U.S. and because the U.S. is a very open economy, it will probably increase the demand from the U.S. to the other economies around the world, and that’s also a positive,” Lagarde said during a week-long trip to Indonesia.

The massive tax overhaul, which cuts the top corporate rate from 35 percent to 21 percent and simplifies many provisions, met some of the IMF’s advice that Washington adopt a simpler, more efficient business tax code. But Lagarde warned the plan threatened to stoke inflation.

“Because of the stimulus impact that it will have on growth, and because the U.S. economy is already growing at full capacity, it might very well have an overheating impact on the economy, which could in turn increase wages – good – increase inflation and entail a tightening of monetary policy, with interest rates rising,” Lagarde said.

New Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell told U.S. lawmakers on Wednesday that he was sticking to a “gradual” approach to interest rate hikes this year.

RATE HIKE SPILLOVERS

The higher rates would nonetheless cause some capital outflows from emerging markets, Lagarde said. Sudden and massive outflows two decades ago prompted IMF bailouts and painful austerity for some southeast Asian countries, including Indonesia.

Lagarde said Indonesia was well-prepared to handle the effects of higher U.S. rates because of much stronger central bank tools that were tested during the 2013 ‘taper tantrum’, during which bond yields rose sharply as the Fed signaled it was ready to slow its bond purchases.

These tools were put to use again on Thursday as Indonesia entered the foreign exchange market to support the rupiah currency after it touched its lowest level in more than two years, about 13,800 to the dollar.

But Lagarde said a bigger concern was the increase in U.S. budget deficits and debt that she said would begin to cut the growth rate starting in 2022.

A fiscal watchdog group, the Center For a Responsible Federal Budget, has estimated the deficit could top $1 trillion as early as 2019 between the tax cuts and a spending increase passed in January.

Trump administration officials maintain that increased growth prompted by the tax cuts would minimize revenue shortfalls.

“So, you combine reduced growth, reduced revenue and you end up with probably an increased fiscal deficit which will impact on the level of debt of the United States,” Lagarde said.

“We have not advocated increasing debt nor increasing deficits. To the contrary, actually.”

TRADE OPTIMISM

Despite concerns that U.S. President Donald Trump will impose new tariffs on steel and aluminum, Lagarde said she was encouraged by some recent trade developments, including a deal forged by 11 members of the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal and intensified talks between the European Union and Mercosur countries.

“There is really a trend toward not necessarily multilateralism but plurilateralism, which is here to stay I think,” Lagarde said.

She said that the international rules of trade should be respected, including those of the World Trade Organization, but they should be continually updated to reflect a constantly changing economy.

She added that the WTO needs to have its appellate function fully restored. The United States has been blocking the appointment of WTO appellate judges it regards as unfavorable to U.S. interests.

And Lagarde has not wavered in her views that trade as an engine of growth, saying: “Trade has more benefits than costs.”

(Reporting by David Lawder; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

March 8, 2018

JAKARTA (Reuters) – Indonesia is making preparations to hand over a luxury yacht seized in Bali last month to U.S. authorities targeting assets allegedly bought with money siphoned off from a Malaysian state fund, a police official said on Thursday.

The Cayman Islands-flagged Equanimity was impounded by Indonesia amid a multi-billion dollar corruption investigation launched by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and tied to 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB).

Indonesian police and the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) were “preparing paperwork” for a hand over of the ship, said Daniel Silitonga, deputy director of economic and special crimes at Indonesia’s criminal investigation bureau.

Silitonga said authorities had taken the vessel’s logbook but a search had not found any money on board.

Police have also questioned the captain and crew but had found no link to an investigation into money laundering, said Agung Setya, director of economic and special crimes at Indonesia’s criminal investigation bureau.

1MDB is at the center of money-laundering probes in at least six countries, including the United States, Switzerland and Singapore.

A total of $4.5 billion was misappropriated from 1MDB by high-level officials of the fund and their associates, according to civil lawsuits filed by the DOJ.

Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak set up 1MDB in 2009 and previously served as chairman of its advisory board. He and the fund have denied any wrongdoing.

Among assets sought under the DOJ investigation is Equanimity, a $250 million yacht bought by Malaysian financier Jho Low, named as a key figure in the U.S. lawsuits which say he used proceeds diverted from 1MDB to buy it.

Low’s whereabouts are unknown and his Hong Kong company has not responded to requests for comment.

A spokesperson for Low was quoted in Malaysian media last week as saying it was “disappointing that, rather than reflecting on the deeply flawed and politically motivated allegations, the DOJ is continuing with its pattern of global over reach – all based on entirely unsupported claims of wrongdoing”.

Malaysian Inspector-General of Police Mohamad Fuzi Harun said in a statement that the seizure of Equanimity in Indonesia was a U.S. court civil forfeiture action against Low and not against 1MDB.  

“The Royal Malaysian Police has also not received any information from Indonesian authorities or the Federal Bureau of Investigation regarding the seizure of the Equanimity in Indonesian waters on Feb 28. The RMP has also not been contacted by any other party to assist in the investigation regarding the yacht.”

(Reporting by Tabita Diela and Rozanna Latiff; in KUALA LUMPUR; Writing by Ed Davies; Editing by Nick Macfie)

March 8, 2018

By Ed Davies and Cindy Silviana

JAKARTA (Reuters) – Indonesia is confident over its readiness to host this year’s Asian Games, though ensuring athletes and fans can get to venues through Jakarta’s traffic-clogged streets remains a challenge, the head of the country’s organizing committee said.

Erick Thohir, an Indonesian businessman and chairman of Italian soccer club Inter Milan, was brought in to lead the committee in 2015 amid concerns over a ballooning budget and whether some venues would be prepared in time.

“We are confident we can have the Asian games… now the challenge is more on transportation issues,” Thohir said in an interview at the committee’s Jakarta headquarters as he looked forward to the Aug. 18-Sept. 2 event.

Indonesia’s preparations received a thumbs-up from the Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) in January following a two-day inspection of facilities for the first staging of the event in two cities, Jakarta and Palembang on Sumatra island.

Even so, challenges surfaced during a dress rehearsal event held last month.

“From the invitation tournament, we have had good feedback about the food, athletes’ villages. Complaints still come from the traffic,” Thohir added.

Jakarta, consistently ranked as having among the world’s worst traffic congestion, is building a subway in the teeming capital. But it will not be ready until 2019, so organizers have proposed closing schools near venues to curb traffic.

Thohir said that toll roads and bus lanes could also be set aside for special use during the Games.

Around 10,000 athletes from 45 nations are expected to compete across 40 sports at the Games.

Indonesia was including combat sports such as jujitsu and pencak silat in the program in a nod to the popularity of mixed martial arts, said Thohir. Jet ski and paragliding have also been added.

Thohir said the budget for the Games was now “secured” at 6.6 trillion rupiah ($479 million), down roughly a quarter from an earlier proposed figure.

This had been achieved by postponing plans for an Asian Youth Games, renovating existing venues rather than building new ones, and attracting more sponsorship, he said.

The organizing team had also been limited in size to around the 400s rather than the usual thousands for such events, while there would be 13,000 volunteers, he said.

For security, Indonesia would deploy the police and military during the Games, including having on hand the bomb squad and sniper teams, said Army Lieutenant General Muhammad Herindra.

The Southeast Asian country last held the Asian Games in 1962 and Indonesian Vice-President Jusuf Kalla said it was important for home athletes to perform well. 

“We finished in 17th place in the last Asian Games in Incheon in 2014. We are aiming to get into the top 10, in order to do that we will need at least 16 gold medals,” Kalla told reporters on Thursday.

(Additional reporting by Jessica Damiana; Editing by John O’Brien)

February 7, 2018

By Kanupriya Kapoor

JAKARTA (Reuters) – The United Nations human rights chief on Wednesday criticized proposals in Indonesia’s parliament to criminalize gay sex and extramarital sex, saying such laws could hurt the country’s beleaguered LGBT community and other minorities.

Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein said he had raised the issue with President Joko Widodo during a three-day visit to the world’s largest Muslim-majority country, where hostility toward the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community has risen sharply in recent years.

“Discussions of (revisions to the criminal code) betray strains of intolerance seemingly alien to Indonesian culture that have made inroads here,” Zeid told a news briefing, adding that he believed the proposed rules were “discriminatory”.

“The hateful rhetoric against the LGBT community that is being cultivated seemingly for cynical political purposes will only deepen their suffering and create unnecessary divisions,” he said.

Indonesia’s parliament is currently deliberating revisions to a Dutch colonial-era criminal code, including proposals to outlaw sex outside marriage, same-sex relations, and co-habitation, all of which were previously unregulated by law.

The revisions have broad support in parliament, where few politicians have stood up for LGBT rights for fear of alienating a largely conservative voter base ahead of legislative and presidential elections next year.

Many officials in President Widodo’s government have said LGBT people, like other citizens, should be free from discrimination and violence. But top officials, including the president, have said that Indonesia’s cultural and religious norms do not accept the LGBT movement.

Activists have raised concerns that, if approved, the new rules could violate basic rights and be misused to target minorities.

Currently, Indonesian law does not regulate homosexuality, except in the ultra-conservative Islamic province of Aceh.

Zeid, a member of the Jordanian royal family who has been in the U.N. post since 2014, said Indonesia was among the most progressive states in Southeast Asia on human rights.

But he also urged Jakarta to address past atrocities – like the 1965 massacre of nearly half a million suspected communists, – and human rights abuses in the easternmost province of Papua, and the use of the death penalty.

“There are some dark clouds on the horizon but … I hope the common sense and strong tradition of tolerance of the Indonesian people will prevail over populism and political opportunism,” he said.

(Reporting by Kanupriya KapoorEditing by Ed Davies and Christopher Cushing)