Terrorist cells are scattered across the Indonesian archipelago and more attacks are inevitable with the militants so entrenched in the impoverished country, a minister said today.

Indonesian Defence Minister Juwono Sudarsono also said Southeast Asian nations must fight terrorism on their "own terms" or risk being seeing as lackeys of nations such as the United States and Australia.

And he warned in an interview with AFP that it would take at least a decade for Indonesia to address the root causes of terrorism - poverty, unequal wealth distribution and corruption.

Indonesia has been the epicentre of terrorist attacks in the region, with more than 240 people dying over the past four years in operations blamed on the regional extremist network Jemaah Islamiah (JI) and its affiliates.

A second Bali bombing in October last year killed 20 people on the popular tourist island, and Sudarsono said he expected further attacks to take place.

"There will be random attacks," he said. "It's not so much the organised network of JI or the al-Qaeda link, it's the random cells established by some of these groups throughout Indonesia."

Random attacks

Sudarsono, who is in Malaysia for regional security talks, said cells were based in the main islands of Sumatra, Kalimantan and Java, as well as Sulawesi and Poso in central Indonesia.

"They are not entirely unified, but it's the randomness of these cell groups that is frightening," he said.

The minister said the United States and Australia, who have lost citizens in attacks on the Indonesian island of Bali, were pressuring regional governments to use unsuitable tactics to fight terrorism.

"Over the past five years, the United States and Australia, because their victims in Bali have been well known, they tend to be impatient, wanting immediate results," he said.

As a result, he said governments were under pressure to bow to practices such as the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) practice of rendition, which sees terrorism suspects transferred out of countries for detention elsewhere.

"So they insist on the governments of Indonesia, of the Philippines, of Malaysia, of Singapore, to nab these terrorists and if necessary, do the sort of thing that the CIA has been doing, rendition. That is, doing covert operations using their operatives," Sudarsono said.

Lackeys of US interests

The minister warned that yielding to the pressure to catch Islamic militants through such practices would create problems for governments like those in Indonesia and Malaysia which are mainly Muslim countries.

"We say it is dangerous because it creates a backlash," he said.

"Let's do it on our terms, because if we do it, then in the eyes of the Islamic community, especially in Indonesia and Malaysia, the legitimacy of our anti-terrorism laws and acts will be much more accepted by our community.

"If you do it at the insistence of the United States, then the governments will be seen as lackeys of the US interests," he added.

Indonesia has significantly stepped up security efforts in response to the threat. But Sudarsono said the militants attracted sympathy by appealing to impoverished groups, making it difficult for authorities to nab suspects.

"You must realise that in Indonesia, there reside more than 36 million who are living below the poverty line, largely Islamic and largely sympathetic to any acts that afflict the comfortable," he said.

The minister said however that the tide of opinion was turning after last year's Bali bombing, as the Islamic communities in Indonesia realised Indonesians were largely the victims of attacks.