UN has yet to decide on troops in E. Timor
JAKARTA (JP): The United Nations will not consider a peacekeeping mission to East Timor in the near future, as it is still focusing its attention on Indonesia's autonomy package offer, UN spokesman Fred Eckhard said on Tuesday.
Eckhard pointed out the UN was still waiting for the results of the tripartite talks between Indonesia and Portugal under the auspices of the UN.
"It is too early to talk about sending a peacekeeping mission to East Timor. We are now talking about an autonomy package, not yet a peacekeeping mission," Antara quoted Eckhard as saying in UN headquarters in New York.
Indonesian Minister of Foreign Affairs Ali Alatas and his Portuguese counterpart, Jaime Gama, are scheduled to start two days of negotiations overseen by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan in New York starting on Wednesday local time.
Alatas disclosed on Monday that the government had decided to modify its proposal of wide-ranging autonomy for the former Portuguese colony on the instruction of President B.J. Habibie. Despite the delay, the minister did not mention any change to the April deadline for the negotiations.
Habibie decided in January to let East Timor become an independent state if East Timorese people and the international community rejected his proposal to grant special autonomy to the tiny territory.
East Timor Police Chief Col. Timbul Silaen quoted visiting UN special envoy Tamrat Samuel as telling him last month in Dili, the capital of East Timor, that the international organization might send a peacekeeping force to disarm pro-independence and pro-integration groups in the territory in March.
Samuel, however, quickly denied Silaen's claim.
Eckhard said that such a mission would require a lengthy planning phase.
U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said here last week that an international presence, including that of the UN, was needed during the transition period in East Timor.
Meanwhile, two Armed Forces (ABRI) members of the Baucau regency military command in East Timor were kidnapped on Sunday and declared missing.
East Timor deputy military commander Col. Mudjiono said in Dili on Tuesday the two -- Sgt. Maj. Katimir and Cpl. Nasikin -- were abducted by a group of youths while on a public bus heading for Baucau from Dili.
The two were treasury staff of Baucau command, Mudjiono said, but it was not clear whether they were wearing their uniforms.
The bus was passing Madoma in Sukalaran village in Vemasse district, around 130 kilometers east of Dili, when the two were abducted.
The youths were reportedly checking whether there were any pro-integrationists on the bus, following rumors that members of two pro-integration groups, Mahidi ("Integration, Alive or Dead") and Besi Merah Putih (Red-and-White Iron), were heading for Baucau.
East Timor Police spokesman Capt. Widodo D.S. said in Dili that Katimir and Nasikin were forced to get off the bus.
"They were then beaten and the youths seized their pistols," Widodo said. (33/prb)