East and West in Timor borderline

East and West in Timor borderline

NEW DELHI: Life in East Timor is an enduring catastrophe.
Roughly 80,000 homes were destroyed in the violence unleashed by
pro-Jakarta militias, backed by the Indonesian Army, last year,
very few of which have been rebuilt.

Much of the infrastructure is gone and most of the population
remains unemployed. The Timorese desperately need foreign
assistance to help them rebuild their country.

Foreign investors, of course, are unenthusiastic because of
the situation created by frequent cross-border raids. The United
Nations refugee operations in that part of the island have been
brought to a dead halt; the border is held precariously by the
7000 UN peacekeeping troops.

The problem is obviously with the Indonesian Army which
doesn't seem interested in keeping its part of the deal. There
has been no effort to disarm the militias or even to rein them
in, without which their stranglehold on the refugees remaining in
the camps in West Timor cannot be broken.

The fear of reprisal is undoubtedly being kept alive. The
capital, Dili, is not far from the border and was a renegade
stronghold before independence. Tensions also exist between the
refugees that returned, loyalties suspect, and those who remained
behind.

The installation of a universal franchise regime will go some
way in alleviating these tensions, by giving a voice to all
parties, but before that some kind of arrangement has to be
reached with the militias. UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has
spoken to Abdurrahman Wahid at the millennium summit; the
Indonesian President must have given his usual soporific
assurances.

There is a question mark over how much influence Abdurrahman
Wahid has over the Indonesian Army which he needs for all kinds
of other paramilitary situations. East Timor will take some time
to raise its own troops and even then may not be able to
effectively counter the Indonesian Army's proxy aggression. The
only answer, therefore, is international pressure on Jakarta.
Plus some money for East Timor.

-- The Statesman, New Delhi