Canberra and Jakarta agree to host terror summit

Canberra and Jakarta agree to host terror summit

Peter O'Connor Associated Press Canberra

Australia and Indonesia will host a regional terror conference early next year, foreign minister Alexander Downer said on Thursday after meeting his Indonesian counterpart.

"We agreed that Australia and Indonesia would co-host a regional ministerial conference on counter terrorism early next year and we've been able to work through some of the broad details of who would be invited ... and the nature of that conference," Downer said after meeting Hassan Wirayuda in Canberra.

Earlier, before the meeting, Downer said a location had not yet been decided, adding "it could be in Indonesia. Actually, it would probably be better to have it in Indonesia."

Canberra and Jakarta have significantly boosted cooperation in the fight against terrorism since the Oct. 12 bombings on the Indonesian island of Bali that killed 202 people, including 88 Australians.

The deadly car bombing outside Jakarta's JW Marriott Hotel earlier this month added impetus to calls for a regional forum to discuss ways of rooting out terrorism in Southeast Asia.

A report in The Sydney Morning Herald newspaper on Wednesday quoted Prime Minister John Howard saying that Australian police and intelligence officials working in Indonesia since the Oct. 12 Bali attacks had helped avert some terror strikes.

"I think we were able to help the Indonesians in relation to some incidents -- potential incidents," Howard reportedly said.

He did not elaborate, but on Thursday Australia's ambassador to Indonesia, John Ritchie also said Indonesian national police had stopped potential terrorist attacks with help from Australian police.

Without going into detail, Ritchie said Indonesian police had "averted quite a lot of incidents of terrorist activity. Australia has been assisting very actively."

Ahead of his meeting with Wirayuda, Downer said both Australia and Indonesia were keen to hammer out details about the terror conference.

"Both of us are quite supportive of this idea, so we need to start working through how we do it," Downer said.

He added that the common threat of terrorism had helped forge stronger ties between Canberra and Jakarta.

"The events of Oct. 12 -- the Bali bombing -- have brought Australia and Indonesia very close together and the degree of cooperation on counter terrorism has been simply extraordinary," he said.