Australia raises East Timor stakes

Australia raises East Timor stakes

By Sid Astbury

SYDNEY (DPA): Australian Prime Minister John Howard visits Bali for talks on East Timor next week in the knowledge that both he and President B.J. Habibie would like the former Portuguese colony to stay a part of Indonesia -- albeit with a level of autonomy not accorded other troubled provinces like Aceh and Irian Jaya.

Howard's reasons for favoring integration are characteristically pragmatic. He knows that Australia would end up subsidizing the new nation. Canberra would also gather the opprobrium of future Indonesian leaders for aiding and abetting in the dismemberment of the republic.

Howard goes into the talks promising only to "underline our concern" over the risk that militias armed by the Indonesian military will tip East Timor into the sort of civil strife that preceded the arrival of Indonesian troops in 1975. He has said publicly that the 15,000 Indonesian troops in East Timor have "not done enough to discourage the violence and killings".

Habibie's reasons for resisting the clamor for independence are equally understandable. He doesn't want to go into June's general election wounded by a failure to keep the country intact. He also wants to retain the support of the military, which has lost 1,400 men in East Timor since it integrated in 1975. There isn't a general enthusiasm among Indonesians to set East Timor free.

Howard and Habibie know that the international pressure behind the independence movement, so strong just a couple of months ago, has subsided. NATO action in Yugoslavia has switched the focus of attention to Europe. Among world leaders there is little appetite for intervention to ease into being a new nation of only 800,000 people in a distant and remote part of the world.

The bloodshed in East Timor has also helped change perceptions. It's no longer possible to argue that almost all East Timorese would vote for freedom if given the opportunity to do so in a plebicite. There are thousands who, for whatever reason, would not tick the secession box. The gangs now in control of Dili's streets are loyal to Jakarta.

Changed perceptions about East Timor have emboldened the mercurial Habibie to backtrack on his original promise to set East Timor free if the autonomy option is rejected. A recognition that the military and some cabinet members were against his surprise offer has also colored his thinking.

Habibie agreed to the talks because Australia has become the western world's proxy in negotiations over the future of East Timor. It is incumbent on him to let foreign heads of government register their disapproval of East Timor's seeming drift into chaos. Above all, he has nothing to lose by listening to Howard.

Howard pushed for the talks in response to a welter of criticism that Australia has failed to influence events in East Timor. Not very convincingly, Howard has declared he is "very strongly committed" to a United Nations-monitored consultation process on the autonomy offer that is supposed to begin in July. He will be reaffirming that commitment in his talks with Habibie.

Howard surprised many by asking to meet Habibie. His forwardness may signify that Australia is ready to take the initiative on East Timor and perhaps be the first to commit troops to a United Nations-sponsored peacekeeping force.

Australia has clout with Jakarta. It is the only Western country to formally endorse Indonesian sovereignty over East Timor and the only country to sign a defense pact with Jakarta. Chaos in East Timor would impact on Australia more than any other county.

Warns Paul Dibb, a national security specialist at the Australian National University: "The situation that is unfolding to our near north is the most important regional contingency to face Australia since the end of the Vietnam war."

But it is hard to see what Howard can tell Habibie that he does not know already. It is not helpful to inform the president that his army is out of control or that his cabinet is in disarray.

Howard is still a long way from taking action. He has rejected calls for Canberra to revoke its formal recognition of the incorporation of East Timor, break off military links and cancel the Australia-Indonesia Security Agreement. And there is little likelihood of Canberra being the one to refer the East Timor issue to the United Nations Security Council.

But a harder line with Jakarta is expected. Just how hard remains to be seen.