Indonesian President Megawati Soekarnoputri on Thursday strongly condemned the bloody accident in the Australian embassy in Jakarta, which killed 11 people and injured 161 others.

Megawati asked people to keep calm and cautious following the explosion. "I am very sad and concerned," the president told reporters after visiting the scene of the explosion and the victims in the MMC hospital near the location.

The president also called on all parties, including the media, to jointly participate in maintaining security in the country.

Meanwhile, presidential candidate Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono of the Indonesian Democratic Party also visited the scene of the accident and urged the police and intelligence agencies to speed up investigation and beef up alertness as the country would hold the second round of the presidential election on Sept. 20.

"We have to maintain security in order not to hamper the presidential race," he told reporters.

Indonesian Chief of Intelligence Hendropriyono said that the country's current legal system has loopholes for terrorists to launch their strikes.

He told reporters at the hospital that radical groups and separatists had potentially implicated in such action.

He said that if the politicians did not support reform of the legal system, such accidents would continue to take place.

(Xinhua News Agency September 10, 2004)