A'LIAN PM TO VISIT INDONESIA JUNE 12-14

Jakarta, June 6 (ANTARA) - Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd will make a visit to Indonesia from June 12 to 14, 2008, a spokesman of the Indonesian foreign affairs ministry said. "It will be PM Rudd's first official visit to Indonesia," Teuku Faizasyah, the ministry's spokesman, said here on Friday. PM Rudd is scheduled to have bilateral meeting with President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to discuss bilateral relations between the two countries. PR Rudd visited Bali, Indonesia, in December 2007 to attend the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Explaining his upcoming visit to Indonesia at an interview with Radio 4BC, Brisbane, on Thursday, PM Rudd said that "with Indonesia, because it's the largest Muslim country in the world, it's our closest large-country neighbor and we have an abiding interest in making sure that relationship is in first class working order". "And with President Yudhoyono, who I caught up with at the Bali Conference on Climate Change just after the new Government was sworn in, we've agreed also to work together on climate change, particularly on rainforests, where Indonesia is host to one of the few large remaining rainforests in the world which are so critical for dealing with the overall challenge of climate change," Ruddsaid.