E. Timor to use dollar as its official currency

E. Timor to use dollar as its official currency

DILI, East Timor (AP): The U.S. dollar is to become East
Timor's official currency while it prepares for eventual self-
government, members of the devastated territory's main
independence group said on Monday.

Officials of the National Council of Timorese Resistance, or
CNRT, said the decision would be announced later Monday by the
International Monetary Fund and the UN, which is administrating
East Timor.

The officials said the decision to use dollars was made in
consultation with their group. They spoke on condition of
anonymity.

East Timor broke away from Indonesia last year after a UN-
supervised ballot Aug. 30 that triggered a bloody backlash by
anti-independence militiamen. International peacekeepers restored
order in September.

As normalcy slowly returns, East Timor's people have been
using the Indonesian rupiah and the U.S. dollar along with the
Australian dollar, introduced by the Australian-led peacekeeping
force, and the Portuguese escudo, the currency of East Timor's
former colonial master.

Separately, the head of the UN authority in East Timor, Sergio
Vieira de Mello, has approved a regulation setting up a central
payments office to regulate East Timor's financial and banking
system, UN spokesman Manoel de Almeida e Silva said Monday.

"The central payments office, which is to ultimately become
East Timor's central bank, is an institution crucial to efficient
payments and a sound banking system in East Timor," he said.