Jakarta  - Thailand will work with the UN refugee agency and neighbouring countries to help Myanmar's Rohingya boat people, Thai Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya said Wednesday.

The Thai military has been accused of mistreating migrants belonging to the Rohingya minority group, who said they were fleeing persecution in Myanmar, by towing more than 10 vessels out to sea and leaving the refugees in engineless boats without sufficient food and water.

Almost 400 of the Rohingya migrants were rescued by the Indonesian Navy off the coast of Aceh province in January and earlier this month.

The Rohingya told Indonesian officials they had been physically abused by Thai authorities before being abandoned at sea.

Jakarta  - Police in East Java province have closed a clinic run by a nine-year-old child believed to possess healing powers after four people died while queuing for treatment, an officer said Tuesday.

Two patients died on Monday while lining up with thousands of others at the house of Muhammad Ponari, who has been called "child witch doctor" by locals, in Jombang district, said police officer Muhammad Indra.

Two other patients died last week in a stampede, he said.

Jakarta - An Indonesian district court on Monday sentenced three Muslim militants to up to nine years in prison after they were convicted of assisting and hiding leaders of the Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) terrorist network.

The Central Jakarta District Court found Abu Husna, Agus Purwanto and Parmin guilty of violating the country's tough anti-terrorism laws, enacted just weeks after the October 2002 bombings of two nightspots on Bali island which killed at least 202 people, mostly foreign visitors.

Jakarta (Indonesia), Feb. 5 : Cricket has blossomed in Indonesia and administrators of the sport are now dreaming of an Indonesian cricket team emerging as a rival to Asian super powers India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.

Despite its proximity to cricket-mad Australia, the mainly Muslim country of 234 million people was a stranger to the sport until the early 1990s when a handful of eccentric expatriates started their own league.

The Daily Telegraph quoted Cricket Indonesia chairman Sachin Gopalan as saying:"It used to be only social games played by expatriates. But it has changed.''''

Jakarta - Women's emancipation and political differences have contributed to a sharp rise in divorce rates in Indonesia since democratic reforms were introduced more than 10 years ago after the fall of autocratic president Suharto, the Ministry of Religious Affairs said Thursday.

The divorce rate has increased steadily every year during the past decade and, during last year, 10 in 100 marriages ended in divorce, the ministry said in a news release posted on its website.

The ministry said 2 million couples get married every year in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim country.

Singapore - A Singapore housewife was sentenced to 10 months in jail for scalding her maid and sending her home to Indonesia without medical attention, media reports said Thursday.

A district judge found the accused, a 40-year-old mother of three, guilty of pouring hot water onto the back of her maid.

According to the public prosecutor, the maid, now 26, suffered second-degree burns to her neck, back and left shoulder that left her body blistered.

The housewife was also accused of trying to cover up the May 15, 2006, incident, by sending her maid back to Indonesia, the Straits Times newspaper reported.