Manila sends 123 troops on mission

Manila sends 123 troops on mission

MANILA (Agencies): Some 123 Filipino soldiers left Manila for Australia on Saturday to join the multinational force given the task of restoring order in bloodied East Timor.

The head of the Philippine humanitarian mission to East Timor, Col. Felix Cabreros, said his group -- including engineers, doctors and dentists -- would join other troops from neighboring countries in Darwin.

"We are going there as a friend, we have no enemy," Cabreros said as his troops prepared to board a C130 military plane.

"We are all noncombatant, we are not going there to fight," he added. "We are going there to help people. We will probably conduct medical or dental outreach, escort food, construct buildings or roads."

Australia, which is leading the international force estimated to number 8,000 personnel, said nine warships had left Darwin.

Tens of thousands of people have fled the shattered territory to escape violence by militias seeking to overturn the results of an Aug. 30 referendum which produced an overwhelming rejection of Indonesia's offer of autonomy.

Cabreros said his troops were expected to stay in East Timor for between three months and six months.

The Philippines has said it plans to send up to two noncombat battalions -- numbering between 600 and 1,200 personnel -- for the East Timor operation.

Separately, the first of two navy ships that Singapore committed to the peacekeeping set sail for Darwin, Australia, over the weekend.

The RSS Excellence will arrive in Darwin by Sept. 28. The second landing ship tank is expected to leave soon.

Singapore has committed 250 personnel comprising a medical detachment, military observers and logistics support.

In Ottawa, Canada's defense ministry announced it would be sending two transport planes and a navy ship to East Timor as part of the UN-backed multinational peacekeeping operation that is about to begin in the Indonesian-ruled territory.

The C-130 Hercules planes carrying about 100 military personnel will leave from an air base in Trenton, Ontario, in the next few days.

A resupply ship, The Protecteur, will sail from the port of Esquimalt, British Columbia, on Thursday, the ministry said.

However, it will take nearly three weeks for The Protecteur and its crew of 250 personnel to reach the violence-torn territory.

In a related development, Britain said on Sunday it was powerless to stop delivery of three British Aerospace Hawk trainer jets that were dispatched to Indonesia in August, before last week's European Union arms embargo came into force.

The British Foreign Office recently demanded an explanation from Jakarta about reports that Hawks had been spotted flying over East Timor. Britain said later that Indonesia had pledged not to use the planes over the territory.

Armed forces minister John Spellar told Sky News in London: "Delivery was taken by the Indonesians before the embargo, indeed before the current crisis.

"They are in fact in Thailand, they are actually in the ownership of the Indonesians. But obviously in the spirit of the embargo, we would prefer that they did not go to Indonesia."

Britain's Ministry of Defense said in a statement that the jets were sent before the EU imposed its arms ban on Indonesia to pressure Jakarta to respect East Timor's vote for independence.