Liquisa nearly a rebel base
Liquisa nearly a rebel base
JAKARTA (JP): Fretilin, the East Timor armed separatist
movement, had been turning the Liquisa regency into its major
base camp when the military moved into the area last month, Armed
Forces Chief Gen. Feisal Tanjung said yesterday.
Military intelligence reports suggested some Fretilin
activities around the regency, including the possibility of an
armed attack to capture the area, Feisal told a hearing with
Commission I of the House of Representatives.
"They had planned to attack Liquisa. They hadn't set the exact
date yet," Feisal said, reading from a report from the East Timor
military command.
The rebels had been planning to turn the town into their base
camp, he said. "Liquisa is very close to the capital city, Dili,"
he added.
Feisal said the information about Fretilin's activities in the
area came from local people.
He said that, given the situation in the area, the decision by
the military command to send in troops to Liquisa had been
"correct".
If the military hadn't acted swiftly and thoroughly, he said,
Liquisa may have been turned into a base for Fretilin to launch a
campaign.
He said that the proximity to Dili made Liquisa a convenient
place for Fretilin, in order to maximize exposure to foreigners
visiting Dili and, thereby, to gain publicity for their campaign.
The Armed Forces (ABRI) chief was asked by legislators
yesterday for an explanation of the killing of six East Timorese
by the military on Jan. 12 in Gariana, Liquisa.
Allegations that the six had been unarmed civilians have
prompted the Armed Forces headquarters in Jakarta to send a fact-
finding team to East Timor.
The National Commission on Human Rights is also conducting its
own investigation and plans to announce its findings later this
month.
The issue dominated yesterday's hearing between Feisal and the
House's Commission I, which deals with security affairs.
Feisal said the ABRI fact-finding team had returned from East
Timor and was now writing up its report.
Council
On a separate occasion yesterday, Army Chief of Staff Gen. R.
Hartono said that he will announce today the line up of the
Officers' Honorary Council who will take up the report and come
up with its recommendations regarding the matter.
Hartono also insisted that the six killed were Fretilin
members and the investigation is looking into whether the
troopers had followed proper procedures in dealing with them
during the clash, Antara reported.
He told reporters that the incident in Liquisa was a "regular
arm contact" that frequently occurred between troopers and
Fretilin.
Feisal yesterday said that, based on the report by East Timor
military chief, Col. Kiki Syahnakri, two of the six East Timorese
killed were Fretilin members. The other four were civilians who
were being recruited by Fretilin.
The report, according to Feisal, underlined that the six were
killed during an armed clash with troops. It refuted the
suggestion, made in the foreign press, that they had been
ordinary and unarmed villagers.
The East Timor military's report stated that the local
military command arrested four people in Liquisa on Jan. 10 who
were believed to have been supplying the rebels with food they
collected from Fretilin supporters in the area.
Subsequent investigations confirmed their suspicion, according
to the report.
Military intelligence had extracted information from the four
about a mobilization of rebels that had been underway since Jan.
5 in the village of Vatuvuo, Maubara district, in Liquisa.
The military estimated that 45 armed people had been deployed
during the mobilization.
Feisal also gave some details of the Jan. 12 clash in Gariana
that led to the death of six East Timorese, again based on the
report by the local military.
It involved the Parkit unit, a military intelligence team, and
rebels numbering about 10 armed people, he said.
During that clash, the military shot dead two rebels.
A soldier was wounded by bullets in his chest and back.
After the first contact, the military search for the rebels'
hideout led to the second armed contact, in which four more
rebels were shot dead. (swe/emb)