Timor Leste commissioners announced

Timor Leste commissioners announced

Ivy Susanti, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Indonesia and Timor Leste announced on Monday the names of the 10
members of the Commission of Truth and Friendship (CTF), who will
look into the violence that took place in Timor Leste in 1999
(then called East Timor).

Foreign ministry spokesman Yuri Oktavian Thamrin said that the
commission would work for reconciliation and future cooperation,
from the government to the grassroots level, but would not seek
judicial settlements.

According to the CTF's terms of reference (TOR), on which the
commissioners will base their work, they will not recommend that
the government of either nation establish any other judicial
body. The CTF process is not meant to lead to prosecution, but
will instead emphasize institutional responsibilities.

"The commissioners are highly credible and we are sure they
will use a reconciliatory approach. And this approach has been
approved by the two governments. In this way, we hope that the
international community will show some respect for the efforts of
the two 'families'; and do not make things difficult for us,"
Yuri told reporters on Monday.

From Indonesia, the commission consists of Prof. Achmad Ali
(law expert from Hassanudin state university in Makassar), Wisber
Loeis (senior diplomat and former Indonesian ambassador to
Japan), Benjamin Mangkudilaga (former Supreme Court Justice and
member of the National Commission of Human Rights), Mgr. Petrus
Turang (Bishop of Kupang, East Nusa Tenggara) and Agus Widjojo
(former Indonesian Military chief of territorial affairs).

Timor Leste appointed Jasinto Alves, Aniceto Guterres,
Felicidade Guterres, Dionisio Babo and Cirilio Varadales.

Yuri said the commissioners will discuss technicalities on
Aug. 4 or Aug. 5 in Denpasar, Bali, where the secretariat will be
located. The commissioners, who get access to all documents
regarding the various human rights trials and interviews of
witnesses, will work for one year, with the possibility of an
extension to a maximum of one more year.

Benjamin Mangkudilaga said that the commission's work was more
of a confidence-building effort.

"I don't see any great challenge ahead. Our mandate has been
clearly stated in the TOR, and it has been approved by both
sides. To me, the most important thing is to build trust through
dialog," he told The Jakarta Post over the phone.

In Dili, however, Catholic Church bishops said that victims of
Timor Leste's bloody break for independence from Indonesia will
only find justice through an international tribunal.

"The Catholic Church requests the continued intervention of
the United Nations to achieve justice for the people of East
Timor," Bishops Basilio do Nascimento and Alberto Ricardo da
Silva said in a statement.

"We hope that the voice of the East Timorese people, who have
suffered from impunity, will be heard," they were quoted by AP as
saying.

The Indonesian Military and its proxy militia groups are
accused of killing nearly 1,500 people after a UN-supervised
referendum in 1999 brought an end to Indonesia's 24-year
annexation of the former Portuguese colony.

Jakarta and Dili have expressed opposition to a UN
recommendation for an international tribunal, saying it would
harm bilateral relations.

"We do not believe the establishment of an international
tribunal is the only way to find truth or justice," Timor Leste
Foreign Minister Jose Ramos Horta said on Monday, rejecting
claims by the bishops that the decision was political.