Hillary Clinton in Indonesia

The NYT has this report:

Reaching out to the world’s most populous Muslim nation and the boyhood home of her boss, President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton arrived in Indonesia on Wednesday, saying she wanted to pay tribute to its hard-won democracy.

“Indonesia has experienced a great transformation in the last 10 years,” she said, hearkening to the Asian financial crisis of 1998, which triggered the ouster of the autocratic regime of President Suharto.

Mrs. Clinton said that her decision to come here — a 3,600-mile detour from her tour of Japan, South Korea, and China — was also driven by a desire to recognize Southeast Asia, a region that senior Obama administration officials said had been neglected by the Bush White House.

The Washington Post regard her visit as  a symbolic one:

Clinton’s visit to the world’s most populous Muslim country highlights President Barack Obama’s desire to forge a better U.S. relationship with the Muslim world, where many of the policies of former president George W. Bush’s administration, including the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, were deeply unpopular.

After talks with Indonesia’s foreign minister, Clinton said the two nations intended to move forward in areas ranging from climate change to security and counter-terrorism.

Reuters has a good FAQ on Clinton’s Indonesia visit and US-Indonesia relations.