Timor devastation 'worse than Bosnia'

Timor devastation 'worse than Bosnia'

BAUCAU, East Timor (AFP): Portuguese President Jorge Sampaio on Monday described the devastation in East Timor as "worse than Bosnia" and appealed to international donors to speed up their aid to the territory.

"It's worse than Bosnia," he told a press conference at this coastal city on the second day of a three day visit.

"I never thought I would see something like this. One could not think that small little houses, corrugated-roofed little houses could be so systematically destroyed," he said of the havoc wreaked by Indonesian armed forces-backed militia after East Timorese voted for independence last year.

"It's necessary that the pledge announced at the donors conferences and the different trust funds must be materialized."

Whole cities were razed to the ground in the militia reign of terror, hundreds killed and more than 250,000 people either fled or were deported before international troops landed on September 20 to halt the rampage.

"We all have the feeling that there is a sense of urgency ... it's a great responsibility for the international community," Sampaio said.

Speaking outside the Baucau church and at a press conference, the president emphasized Portugal's own aid was extended "only as a friend," and that Lisbon had no dreams of recolonizing East Timor, which it ruled for 400 years before the 1975 Indonesian invasion.

"We cannot impose anything. Portugal has nothing to demand of East Timor. Portugal has a duty, a duty in the context of international community, to help the United Nations and the Timorese so that the (reconstruction) initiative can become a reality," he said.

"(The attention of the world) is focused on the day-to-day lives of the Timorese ... you must respond to the world, you must say that you know that the struggle now is for peace, for security, for reconstruction and national reconciliation."

Earlier Monday, Sampaio decorated East Timorese Bishop Basilio do Nascimento with one of his country's highest honors, the Great Cross of the Order of Liberty.

"Don Basilio was in his own way a hero, a hero of freedom," the president said, as he presented the bishop with the yellow and white sash from which the medallion was suspended.

Nascimento, the bishop of Baucau, worked hand in hand with the local Indonesian military commander and the local pro-Jakarta militia and resistance to save the town from the wave of violence that destroyed the rest of the country after last year's independence vote.

"I share this honor with my religious colleagues, with men of the resistance, and members of the local government," he told Sampaio.

"I hope to share it with some Indonesians, the military commander, the police commander, the commander of the militia" in Baucau, he added.

UN personnel working in Baucau during and after the Aug. 30 ballot in which East Timorese voted overwhelmingly for independence from Indonesia, have said Baucau was a unique model of cooperation.

Because of that, they said, it was the only city in East Timor to escape being virtually destroyed.

Sampaio is the first Portuguese head of state to visit the tiny half-island, which was a colony of Lisbon before Portugal's abrupt withdrawal in 1975 triggered Indonesia's invasion and 24- year occupation.

Sampaio received news from Portugal on Monday that his mother had died. East Timorese independence leader Xanana Gusmao, who accompanied Sampaio to Baucau, was seen consoling him.