Plot to kill Xanana foiled

Plot to kill Xanana foiled

DILI, East Timor (AP): United Nations police on Wednesday arrested three men in connection with a possible assassination attempt on independence leader Jose Alexandre "Xanana" Gusmao, who accused political opponents linked to the Indonesian military of being behind the alleged plot.

Gusmao spoke shortly after police intervened during a political gathering to arrest three men trying to push their way through the crowd toward him.

Officers found two hand grenades in an abandoned house nearby. The men were not armed at the time of their arrest, authorities said.

A police commander said they were tipped off about a plot to kill the man widely expected to become East Timor's first president when it achieves independence later this year.

Dacosta Sousa, the UN police commissioner in the capital, Dili, said officers monitored the suspects during the meeting in a Dili auditorium.

The United Nations, which is administering East Timor as it moves from Indonesian territory to independence, has accused hard-line elements within the Indonesian military of organizing and training militias in an effort to destabilize the nascent nation.

Indonesia's U.S.-trained special forces brigade, known as Kopassus, was accused of organizing a number of armed incursions into East Timor since September 1999, when international peacekeepers took control of the half-island territory to quell violence that followed an August 1999 UN-organized referendum on independence.

Gusmao said later that the three men arrested during the melee once had close links with the Indonesian army, which occupied East Timor in 1974 and ruled it as a fiefdom for 24 years.

"I do not say they are now backed by Kopassus or the Indonesian military. I only present the situation to the East Timorese people," Gusmao said.

He showed reporters a photo of one of the suspects, identified as Americo Nascimento, with two Kopassus officers.

In Jakarta, a foreign ministry spokesman said he had no information about the incident.

"These (accusations) must be proved," said spokesman Sulaiman Abdulmanan. "They could just be made to damage Indonesia's image."

Gusmao said the suspects were members of a pro-Indonesia gang that terrorized East Timor and acted as auxiliaries for the occupation forces during the 1990s.

Gusmao also played a tape recording of three men discussing how to kill him in a grenade attack Wednesday morning.

UN officials, speaking on condition of anonymity said the other two men in police custody were former members of the Indonesian intelligence service.

Sousa said all three had been charged with the burning of two UN vehicles in Dili last month.

"We have to ask, knowing the background of these people, who is provoking division among us and who is provoking revolt against the international community," Gusmao said.

He appeared to be referring to a spate of violent incidents between the 2,000-strong UN police force -- which consists mainly of foreigners -- and local youths.

Many East Timorese say they are frustrated by the lack of jobs and the slow pace of reconstruction. The territory was devastated by the Indonesian army and militia gangs following a UN- supervised independence referendum 19 months ago.

After the arrival of international peacekeepers, the militiamen fled to Indonesian-held West Timor, from which they have mounted repeated armed incursions into East Timor.

Two UN soldiers and numerous civilians have been killed by the infiltrators. UN officials have warned that the paramilitaries may try to disrupt upcoming elections by mounting terrorist attacks inside the territory.