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Jakarta's new Muslim-based pornography law threatens tourism and the native lifestyle of Hindu Bali.

Luh Anggraeni of the Bali People's Component, an umbrella group of artists and intellectuals opposed to the draft law, said it would criminalise innocent people who did not follow strict Islamic notions of decency.

"So we will see more women and men arrested in future because they wear clothes or stage art performances that according to the hardliners are violating the pornography law," she said.

The same bill drew large protests in Bali and other islands two years ago, but Jakarta-based MPs backed by Muslim parties have pushed ahead with the plan and parliament is expected to pass it into law in October.

Bali Governor Made Mangku Pastika has said the bill fails to consider cultural diversity in a nation which stretches from the conservative Islamic province of Aceh to the animist highlands of Papua, where women go topless and men wear almost nothing but long gourds on their penises.

"It should provide sufficient space to accommodate the prevailing local wisdom in different communities across the nation," former police detective Pastika was quoted as saying in The Jakarta Post.

"Many people in Papua still live naked or half-naked. Are we going to arrest them all?"

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