UN team starts East Timor inquiry in Jakarta
UN team starts East Timor inquiry in Jakarta
Muninggar Sri Saraswati
The Jakarta Post/Jakarta
A United Nations team began a series of meetings here on Thursday
with top officials in a bid to assess Indonesia's efforts to
account for gross human rights abuses that marred East Timor's
breakaway from this country in 1999.
The UN Commission of Experts, comprising an Indian judge, a
Japanese law professor and a Fijian lawyer, held closed door
talks with President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and Minister of
Foreign Affairs Hassan Wirayuda.
The three-member team is also scheduled to meet Attorney
General Abdul Rahman Saleh, Chief Justice Bagir Manan, Minister
of Justice and Human Rights Hamid Awaluddin, lawmakers and the
National Commission on Human Rights during their three-day visit,
which ends on Friday.
Hassan asserted that the government had invited the team, whose
mandate will expire next month, because the outcome of its
inquiry would serve to "complement the Commission of Truth and
Friendship".
Indonesia had earlier refused to issue visas to the UN-
sanctioned commission, arguing that the team was redundant with
the setting up of the Commission of Truth and Friendship jointly
by East Timor and Indonesia to bring about reconciliation between
the two nations.
After meeting President Susilo, the UN experts said they were
satisfied with their initial talks.
"So far we are satisfied," said Shaista Shameem of Fiji, who
heads the commission.
India's Prafullachandra Bhagwati added that, "We are just
trying to find out and so far the work is already interesting".
Yozo Yokota of Japan said the commission would forward the
results of its assessment to both Indonesia and East Timor. He
declined to comment further.
Minister Hassan acknowledged that the commission, which will
report to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, could recommend that
the world body haul Indonesia before an international criminal
tribunal as a result of what transpired in East Timor.
However, he voiced optimism that the team would not do so.
"It's not realistic to create an international tribunal for
human rights violations in East Timor," Hassan said, pointing out
that similar international courts for Cambodia and Yugoslavia
took a long time to make progress and were very expensive.
The visiting UN Commission of Experts is examining Indonesia's
failure to jail military officers and civilians indicted for
human rights abuses in East Timor.
Hassan admitted that the results produced by the Indonesian ad
hoc human rights court, which acquitted all military and police
officers, were "imperfect".
"East Timor played a role (in the imperfect results). Imagine
a legal process where finding witnesses alone is already a
difficult process," he said.
Hassan recalled that some East Timorese witnesses, including
then Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo, had refused to testify at the
trials, although he was offered the possibility to do so by way
of a video linkup.
He said that both Jakarta and Dili had now agreed "to move
forward toward reconciliation".
Many people were killed when Indonesia-backed militias went on
a rampage in East Timor after it voted to secede from Jakarta in
August 1999. Many believe that the Indonesian Military was behind
the mayhem.
In the aftermath of the violence, a UN Security Council
resolution called for those responsible to be brought to justice.
Under intense international pressure, Indonesia set up an ad
hoc human rights tribunal. However, many have criticized the
tribunal as a "sham" after it acquitted all but one of the 18
military and police officers and government officials who were
put on trial.