Xanana assures release of Indonesian Army captain

DILI, East Timor (JP): East Timor independence leader Jose Alexandre "Xanana" Gusmao promised on Saturday to release an Indonesian Army captain, who has been held in captive since Sept. 7, soon.

"CNRT (East Timor National Resistance Council) will free Captain I.G.K. Hartawan so that he could leave East Timor together with the remaining Indonesian forces," Xanana, who is the council's chairman, told a media briefing in Dili.

Hartawan was deputy chief of the Soibrada district military command at a time when he was abducted by Falintil, the armed wing of the East Timor independence movement, on Sep. 7, three days after the United Nations announced that a referendum in the territory voted overwhelmingly for independence.

A massive terror campaign by pro-Indonesia forces ensued that announcement.

Hartawan was abducted by Falintil in retaliation to the reported death of a prominent pro-independence leader Mauhudu, who was meeting with a delegation of the National Commission on Human Rights in Kupang, capital of West Timor, at the time.

The Indonesian Military had denied any knowledge or any role in the disappearance of Mauhudu.

Xanana, who returned to East Timor for the first time after seven years of imprisonment in Jakarta, promised to rebuild his homeland from the ashes but declined to say if he would accept the job of president of an independent East Timor.

"I came to work here with my compatriots to try to begin sweeping up the ashes and to plant seeds of hope," he said.

Wearing his combat uniform, he was cheered by East Timorese staff at the UN compound Dili as he arrived to speak.

Scores crowded outside, craning their necks to see the man most expect to lead their nation.

"I will be here for the rest of my life," Gusmao said.

But asked whether he would accept the job of president, he said: "When will they ask me? Many things can change."

Xanana said he had met a task force of Indonesian officials in Dili to discuss the return of refugees who had fled or were forcibly moved to West Timor during last month's violence, and to request Indonesia crack down on militias in West Timor.

Around 250,000 people are in refugee camps in West Timor, and the United Nations estimates 150,000 want to return.

"For the sake of a good future relationship, we should not foster violence between East and West Timorese," Gusmao said.

Reuters also reported that the United Nations International Force in East Timor (Interfet) tightened its grip on the enclave of Oecussi on Saturday, pouring troops, food aid and equipment into the isolated area by air and sea.

"This morning by helicopter and from the sea we continued to build up the presence in the enclave," Interfet spokesman Colonel Mark Kelly told reporters in Dili.

"That includes additional infantry soldiers and armored personnel carriers to provide them protection and mobility."

Oecussi, surrounded on three sides by Indonesian-controlled West Timor and on the north by the sea, represents the last major piece of the East Timorese puzzle to be secured by Interfet, which has now been operating here for 33 days.

Kelly told reporters that an investigation into a mass grave in a well in Liquica, about 30 km (20 miles) west of Dili, had to be abandoned on Friday because of fears of a cave-in.

Eleven bodies had already been recovered but there were other, badly decomposed remains at the site that were covered when the excavation was sealed and blessed by an army chaplain.

The United Nations has been extremely slow to dispatch teams of forensic investigators to East Timor despite the documented presence of many fresh graves.

In New York, a Security Council vote to establish a UN force of more than 9,000 troops and thousands of civilians to lead East Timor to independence will take place on Monday, council president Sergei Lavrov of Russia said on Friday.

"We just agreed that East Timor will be voted on Monday morning," he told reporters after council consultations.

This followed agreement on compromise wording to meet Chinese objections to any mention in the draft of an inquiry into atrocities committed against civilians in East Timor. (33)