Reforms measures help turn financial tide in Indonesia

Jakarta - Indonesia's financial markets took heart yesterday from the government's latest reform measures in thin trading ahead…

Jakarta - Indonesia's financial markets took heart yesterday from the government's latest reform measures in thin trading ahead of the country's major festival.

But attacks by hundreds of Islamic school pupils in two small Central Java coastal towns this week were a further warning to the authorities of the tensions aroused by Indonesia's worst economic crisis in decades. The battered rupiah currency, which at its worst has dropped over 80 per cent in value against the dollar since last July, continued to strengthen on the reform news.