Dili court to arrest witnesses

DILI: District court prosecutors plan to arrest four witnesses to the Nov. 17, 1996 beating of Gaudensius Mau, the local correspondent of a Jakarta-based news weekly.

They said yesterday the witnesses had ignored three summonses without reason, hampering the trials of the four people charged with beating up the Tiras magazine journalist.

The action against the witnesses, Eduardo Concelino, Delia Soares Marten Sarmento, Lita Lay Freitas and Angelina Thomas Ximenes, was announced by prosecutor Bambang Riyanto.

Gaudensius was beaten up in Dili by a group of strangers who allegedly mistook him for a police informant.

The witnesses' refusal to answer the summonses forced the court to adjourn the trial, Antara reported.

Charged with assaulting Gaudensius are Jose Antonio Soares, aged 23, Jaime De Jesus Rebeiro Verdial, 16, Americo Seroa, 20, and Jacob Fernandes, 20. (pan)