EXTRA_DIST and external or outside directories

[jling]

Is there a way to include a directory which is external or outside of 
the $(top_srcdir) and which is not involved in the build process?

I tried putting the following in my Makefile.am:

EXTRA_DIST = $(top_srcdir)/../../perl $(top_srcdir)/../../java

But, when I do a 'make dist' it does not attempt to include either of 
these directories in my tarball.

Is this because it ignores anything outside of the toplevel source 
directory?  Is there a work around?


Thanks,
John Ling