Indonesia may host a meeting of a group of 14 nations assisting U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki Moon in his efforts to spur changes in Myanmar, an official said Friday.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Kristiarto Legowo earlier declined to confirm whether the meeting will take place in Indonesia.

However, when asked whether U.N. special envoy on Myanmar Ibrahim Gambari raised a proposal for the meeting to be held in Jakarta during his visit last week to Indonesia, Legowo said, “It was touched on, but it’s still at a very early stage.”

“We need to discuss it further, for example about the modalities. So, we want to hear more details,” he told a small group of reporters at his office.

The idea came up following suggestions from Myanmar advocates in the United States that Ban should convene the next meetings of the group in such Asian capitals as Jakarta or Beijing, thus making regional countries more committed and involved in U.N.-led mediation efforts.

The Group of Friends of the Secretary General on Myanmar is a consultative forum for developing a shared approach in support of the implementation of the secretary general’s good offices mandate for Myanmar.

Consisting of Australia, Indonesia, Russia, the United States, China, Japan, Singapore, Vietnam, France, Norway, Thailand, India, Portugal and Britain, the group met in an informal format in the U.N. headquarters in New York in December and early this month.

Gambari will visit Myanmar next week, during which he will try to meet with junta chief Senior Gen. Than Shwe, chairman of the State Peace and Development Council, as well as opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

Last week in Jakarta, Gambari said he intends to discuss with Myanmar’s ruling generals its decision to bar opposition leader Suu Kyi from multiparty elections to be held in 2010.

Myanmar Foreign Minister Nyan Win told foreign ministers of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations during a meeting in Singapore early this month that Suu Kyi will not be allowed to run under the newly crafted constitution.

Singapore Foreign Minister George Yeo quoted Nyan Win as saying that in the new constitution, a Myanmar citizen who has a foreign husband and children will be disqualified from running for public office, as was the case in the country’s 1974 constitution.
Nobel Peace Prize laureate Suu Kyi, who has spent much of the past 17 years under house arrest, married Michael Aris, a British citizen who died in Britain in 1999, and had two children by him who are British nationals.

In an interview with Kyodo News in Tokyo on Thursday, Gambari urged the junta to “reconsider” the draft constitution for more freedom and to ensure “freedom of political prisoners including Aung Sun Suu Kyi and opportunity for free expression of views.”