UN mission calls on RI to clamp down on militias

ATAMBUA, East Nusa Tenggara (JP): A visiting UN Security Council mission has demanded that the Indonesian government crack down on prointegration militias sheltering in East Nusa Tenggara (NTT) despite claims that significant steps have already been taken.

"Intimidation must stop," said Namibian Ambassador to the UN Security Council Martin Andjaba, after laying flowers at the site where three UN aid workers were murdered by militiamen on Sept. 6.

Andjaba, who led the seven-member mission, also said that an estimated 120,000 East Timorese refugees still in Indonesian territory had to be allowed to return home "in safety and security".

"Some of the refugees we met were concerned about the safety and security situation in East Timor.

"Better information is needed here to be given to the refugees. When we were in East Timor, it was confirmed and assurances were confirmed to us by the Timorese leaders that there will be security and safety for refugees when they go back there," he said.

The visit was the first to be made by UN officials since hundreds of aid workers left the territory following the killing of the three UN workers and an attack on the mission's headquarters.

The Security Council and other international organizations have called on Indonesia to disarm and disband the prointegration militias.

In the past two months, security personnel have conducted sweeping operations for illegal weapons. Officials claim that most illegal arms have been confiscated.

Lt. Gen. Kiki Syahnakri, the deputy Army chief of staff who accompanied the visiting envoys, urged international aid agencies to return to the territory.

He said the militias had been disbanded and 90 percent of their arms impounded.

"They still have a few weapons, so we continue to disarm them," Kiki said.

On Wednesday the delegation visited the Haliwen refugee camp. The tense envoys were welcomed cheerfully by the refugees in the makeshift camp.

The camp, home to 12,000 refugees, was built in a bleak stadium on the outskirts of Atambua, 25 kilometers (15 miles) from the border with East Timor.

West Timor police chief I Made Mangku Pastika conceded that the camp was also home to former pro-Jakarta militia leaders.

"What we have here is the ex-militia, they are now living among the refugees," he told journalists. "There are some of them in Haliwen."

Camp leaders repeated a common message: "We will return when we can bring back the Red and White (Indonesian) flag," Augustine Pinto and Antonio dos Santos told the envoys separately.

Pinto, who called himself the leader of the Dili branch of the Union of Timorese Warriors (UNTAS) and a former member of Dili's local government under Indonesian rule, said the people in Haliwen were not ready to return.

"We will only go back if we can be guaranteed that we can live peacefully while remaining loyal to Indonesia," Pinto said as quoted by AFP.

UNTAS group's former East Timor militias, are blamed for the wave of violence that devastated East Timor and left at least 600 dead after it voted for independence from Indonesia over 14 months ago.

The delegates arrived in Jakarta later in the day to continue discussions with the Indonesian government.