Give RI a 'bit more time'

Give RI a 'bit more time'

GENEVA (AFP): Indonesia should be given "a bit more time" to
take judicial action against people suspected of involvement in
last year's atrocities in East Timor after its vote for
independence, the UN official running East Timor, Sergio Vieira
de Mello, said here on Friday.

De Mello, in Geneva for a five-day visit, told a news briefing
that what needed to be determined now was whether the files of 22
suspects named by the Indonesian attorney general's office in
early September would be passed on to the courts.

"We're reaching a point where we can make a determination as
to whether the Indonesian judiciary is or is not acting on these
cases," he told reporters.

"So let's give them a bit more time," he added.
De Mello also referred to the arrest of former East Timorese
militia leader Eurico Guterres and "practical steps" by the army
and police to disarm militia as "positive signs".

Pro-Indonesian militias went on a rampage of killings and
destruction after the ballot result of August 1999, forcing some
300,000 people to flee into Indonesian-controlled West Timor.