'Soldiers joined in attacks on refugees'

'Soldiers joined in attacks on refugees'

Tertiani ZB Simanjuntak, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Prosecutors of the ad hoc Human Rights Tribunal said on Tuesday
that military personnel wearing militia uniforms participated in
a bloody attack on civilians taking refuge at the residence of
East Timor Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo on Sept. 6, 1999.

In the first session of the trial of former Dili military
commander Lt. Col. Soedjarwo, the prosecutors charged the
defendant with crimes against humanity for failing to prevent
armed militiamen from attacking the refugees.

Soedjarwo could be sentenced to a minimum of 10 years in
prison if found guilty.

Prosecutor Hotman Ambarita said that on Sept. 6, 1999, armed
pro-Jakarta militiamen and soldiers wearing militia uniforms came
to Belo's residence and forced the refugees to leave.

"The refugees were led to Mother Mary Park in front of the
bishop's residence ... there was a yell 'attack' and the
prointegration group opened fire on the refugees," Hotman said.

According to Bishop Belo's statement, two civilians were
killed in the attack, including a 10-year-old girl, Lili, who was
shot in the left eye.

There was no clear, independent report on the real number of
fatalities.

The incident took place just two days after the result of the
Aug. 30 United Nations-brokered ballot was announced.

Soedjarwo was also accused of being responsible for the attack
on the Dili diocesan building, which was sheltering at least
5,000 refugees, on Sept. 5. The building was completely burned
down, with at least 25 people reportedly killed.

Presiding Judge Andi Samsan Nganro adjourned the hearing until
July 1 to hear the defense statement.

Meanwhile, former East Timor military commander Brig. Gen.
Noer Muis said that most East Timorese staffers of the United
Nations Mission in East Timor (UNAMET) preparing for the ballot
stayed in churches as the polling places were nearby.

Noer Muis was testifying during the trial of five military and
police personnel, and civilian officials allegedly responsible
for the killing of civilian refugees in a Suai church.

He said that before the attack on Suai's St. Ave Maria Church,
which killed 27 people, including three Catholic priests, church
officials prevented the military and police from entering the
compound where proindependence supporters had taken refuge.

Another witness, forensic expert Budi Sampurno, revealed that
only 26 bodies were exhumed by his team on Nov. 25, 1999, from
three mass graves on a sandy beach in Belu district, East Nusa
Tenggara, near the border with East Timor.

He said that 12 of the victims had died from gunshot wounds,
eight from slash wounds, three from other kinds of wounds, while
the cause of death of three others could not be determined due to
the decomposed state of the corpses.

"From the condition of the bones and the matching marks on the
corpses' clothes, we assumed that they had been hit by high
velocity bullets," he said, adding that no bullets were found in
the sand to help them identify the kinds of weapons used.

The ad hoc Human Rights Tribunal is scheduled to open the
trial of former militia leader Eurico Guterres on Thursday.