JAKARTA -- Indonesia's government will revoke the citizenship of those who travel to Afghanistan to fight against any US military operation there, a senior official said.

Immigration director Muhamad Indra, quoted in Tuesday's Jakarta Post, said the law allowed for this since such Indonesians would be engaging in overseas military action without the government's consent.

Some groups have called for a jihad (holy war) if the United States attacks Afghanistan -- where Osama bin Laden, Washington's chief suspect in the Sept 11 terror attacks is believed to be hiding.

The Islamic Youth Movement says it has registered hundreds of volunteers for jihad.

But the Jakarta Post said immigration offices nationwide would be ordered not to issue the necessary travel documents.

'This country is not declaring war against another country,' said the immigration chief.

'Letting them enter Afghanistan and join military groups to fight the US and its allies is tantamount to us declaring war on the US.'

He added that the government had not taken similar action in the 1980s, when thousands of Indonesians fought against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, because local participation had not been substantiated at the time.

Islamic Youth Movement chairman M. Iqbal Siregar brushed aside the threat, saying 625 people in Jakarta alone had signed up for jihad.

The statement from the immigration chief was the first indication of a possible tougher line on near-daily anti-US protests in the world's most populous Muslim nation.

The US State Department last week told all Americans to consider leaving Indonesia and authorised non-essential diplomatic staff to go if they wished.

The announcement came after several militant Muslim groups threatened to 'sweep' or search for citizens of countries which supported any US attack on Afghanistan and to drive them out of Indonesia. -- AFP

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