Former police chief blames superiors for East Timor debacle

Former police chief blames superiors for East Timor debacle

Tiarma Siboro, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

A witness in the human rights trial into the East Timor mayhem
said on Wednesday that top state officials in Jakarta should have
been held accountable for the violence that ravaged the former
Indonesian province in 1999.

Brig. Gen. Timbul Silaen, who testified against former East
Timor governor Abilio Jose Osorio Soares, looked emotional when
he told the court he had done his best within his ability to stop
the violence, which erupted following the independence ballot
there on Aug. 30, 1999.

"Those accountable for security affairs at the national level
are Feisal Tanjung and Wiranto. I was only a field officer who
received orders from the National Police chief. Who was I to
maintain security there?" Silaen said.

He was referring respectively to the then coordinating
minister for security and political affairs and the Indonesian
Military chief, who escaped prosecution in the case. Wiranto has
testified to the court.

"Ultimately, it should be (former president) B.J. Habibie that
should take responsibility, considering the fact that the
decision to hold a referendum in East Timor was the
government's," Silaen said.

Silaen, the only witness to appear on Wednesday, is being
tried separately under the same charges as Abilio.

The two are charged under Article 9 of Law No. 26/2000 on
rights tribunals, with the killing of civilians at separate
locations in East Timor, including the Liquica incident on April
6, 1999, and attacks by pro-Jakarta militias on the residences of
proindependence leaders, Manuel Viegas Carrascalao and Leandro
Isaac on April 17, 1999.

Both Abilio and Silaen are also standing trial for crimes
against humanity, which claimed 27 lives during the attack on St.
Ave Maria Church in Suai and the raid on the residence of Dili
Bishop Carlos Felipe Ximenes Belo following the ballot.

Silaen said the violence in East Timor had been exaggerated
when compared with other clashes that occurred in the country.

"The number of people who died in East Timor was far fewer
than those in the sectarian conflicts in Ambon and Poso," Timbul
said, referring to the prolonged clashes between Muslims and
Christians in the Maluku and Central Sulawesi towns between 1999
and 2002.

Silaen also told the court that local administration in East
Timor was in practice taken over by the UN after the tripartite
meeting in New York between the UN and the Indonesian and
Portuguese governments on May, 5, 1999. That meeting decided how
the self-determination ballot in the province would be run.

Presiding Judge Emmy Marni Mustafa adjourned the trial to May
1, to hear other witnesses.