JAKARTA, Indonesia >> Indonesia's vice president told two visiting U.S. senators yesterday that there were no international terrorists in the world's most populous Muslim country. No terrorists in
Indonesia, Inouye toldAssociated Press
Sen. Daniel Inouye, D-Hawaii, and Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, met Indonesian Vice President Hamzah Haz in his residence during an unpublicized five-hour stopover in Jakarta.
Some U.S. officials have speculated that al-Qaida members may be able to find safe haven in Indonesia, which is home to several hard-line Islamic groups and has poorly policed borders.
"I explained (to them) that in Indonesia there is no terrorist networks," Haz said after the meeting. "All there is is Islamic solidarity."
Washington cannot help Indonesia's military target suspected terrorists due to a congressional ban on military contact between the two nations.
Links with Indonesia's armed forces were curtailed after its army helped local militias devastate East Timor in 1999 when the region chose independence in a U.N. referendum.
In December, Inouye inserted a provision in a $318 billion defense appropriations bill that provides for an anti-terrorism training program for Indonesian and other Southeast Asian military officers.
Inouye and Stevens are on the Senate Appropriations Committee. They visited Afghanistan and Pakistan earlier this month.
This week, the two will travel to the Philippines, where U.S troops are helping local forces wipe out a Muslim extremist group linked to the al-Qaida network.