June 18, 1999
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| June 18, 1999 | atimes.com | |
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| Southeast Asia Concern over murderous fox in Timor chicken house UNITED NATIONS - Human rights groups are complaining about Indonesia's decision to appoint the head of a pro-Jakartamilitia to head the civil defense unit in Dili, the capital ofEast Timor. One coalition, the International Federation for East Timor(IFET), wrote UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan to stress thatEurico Guterres - the leader of the Aitarak (Thorn) militia - isnot an appropriate choice for maintaining security in East Timor. ''It is inconceivable that these known murderers should begiven any role in safeguarding security,'' IFET declared, inreferring to Guterres's paramilitaries. The appointment had been praised by Indonesia's police chief inEast Timor, Col. Timbul Silaen. but the move to bring aparamilitary leader - whose group has been linked to theharassment and killing of hundreds of pro-independence Timorese -has sparked concern among UN officials in the run-up to the scheduled August 8vote on self-determination for the territory. UN officials have been scrambling to ensure that the UN Missionin East Timor (UNAMET) can provide stability sothat an estimated 800,000 people can vote on whether to acceptautonomy within Indonesia or opt for independence. The UN Security Council voted last Friday to approve thedeployment of some 270 police advisers in East Timor within thenext few weeks. UN officials later said that all the policeshould be deployed by the end of June. Yet the United Nations must rely on Indonesia, which invadedEast Timor in 1975 and annexed it one year later, to providesecure conditions for the vote. The appointment of Guterres hasadded new worries. One UN official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said thatIndonesia could try to appoint the paramilitary leaders to headcivil defense units, but that such a move likely would not beaccepted internationally. Annan, in a report issued last month, warned that ''themilitias, believed by many observers to be operating with theacquiescence of the [Indonesian] army, have not only have attackedpro-independence groups, but are beginning to threaten moderatepro-integration supporters as well." ''The Aitarak militia are in the forefront of the pro-integration campaign, which is their very reason for existence,''IFET wrote Tuesday. ''They not only propagate their views inwords, but also by killing pro-indepedence leaders andactivists." Guterres has acknowledged his role in the militias, as well ashis opposition to independence supporters who, according to groupslike IFET, comprise the vast majority of Timorese. In a recent interview with the British Broadcasting Coporation(BBC), the militia leader admitted that his Aitarak group receivedarms from the Indonesian military. In recent weeks, the militias have rounded up some 30,000Timorese displaced by recent fighting in camps where pro-independence views are discouraged, argued Sidney Jones, executivedirector of Human Rights Watch-Asia. Even as UNAMET staff arrived in East Timor, UN officials warnedthat the civil defense units must not play a major role inproviding security for the August 8 vote. Ian Martin, head of the UNAMET office, said the United Nationsbelieves that ''it is the police and only the police who shallplay the security role, so we expect to progressively see that that isthe case." Martin said that, as UN officials were arriving, a sense ofsecurity was growing among Timorese, particularly in Dili. But headded, ''I don't think anything like a sufficient sense ofconfidence has been created." (Inter Press Service) | |||||||||
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