Also: 
BELU PEOPLE'S CLEAN-WATER PROBLEM SOLVED 
INDONESIANS, EX-EAST TIMORESE HOPE JAPAN WOULD CONTINUE AID

Antara - The Indonesian National News Agency

January 20, 2004

INDON DISTRICT NEEDS MORE RESETTLEMENT SITES FOR EX-EAST TIMORESE REFUGEES

Atambua, E Nusa Tenggara, Jan 20 (ANTARA) - Belu district in Indonesia's East Nusa Tenggara province needs resettlement sites for more than 6,000 former East Timorese refugees, a spokesman said here Tuesday.

"At least 5,000 houses are needed to accommodate East Timorese families still living in emergency camps in Belu," coordinator of an agency tasked to tackle disaster victims and refugee (Satlak PBP), Lt Col Ganip Warsito, said.

Emergency camps in Belu will be closed once there are enough houses for the refugees, he said.

About 5,000 families of the 6,000 East Timorese families are ready to move to a new resettlement area, he said, adding that the remaining 1,000 families do not want to be resettled, saying they have bought land near the emergency camps.

Warsito said the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) built 850 houses and the Indonesian Body for Disaster and Refugees built 200 others for refugees in Belu in 2003.

The largest emergency camp here and another camp in a nearby protected forest were closed last year following the setting up of 1,050 houses, he said.

The Udayana regional military command built 100 houses in Tasifeto Barat subdistrict last year for active military families and former East Timorese who have retired from the Indonesian Defense Force (TNI), he said.

Antara - The Indonesian National News Agency

January 20, 2004

BELU PEOPLE'S CLEAN-WATER PROBLEM SOLVED

Atambua, E Nusa Tenggara, Jan 20 (ANTARA)- People in Belu district, including former East Timorese refugees staying in camps, now finally have access to clean water thanks to the efforts of Oxfam, a British non-governmental organization, to build a water-pipe netwerk in cooepration with the Indonesian Care Foundation (YPI).

"In June 2003, Oxfam sent pipes and other needed materials to set up clean water networks in Takarai and Kereana villages in the Sasita Mean's subdistrict of Belu district. Now, the local people no longer have difficulty obtaining clean water," said YPI Director Andreas Pareira here on Tuesday.

He said people in the area had been experiencing a clean water problem for a long time. The problem was only aggravated when East Timorese refugees came to the sub district.

According to data compiled by the Sasita Mean subdistrict administration, Takarai village was inhabited by 225 indigenous East Nusatenggara families or 1,265 people in addition to 41 ex-East Timorese refugee families or 218 people.

In Kereana village there were 238 indigenous East Nusatenggara families or 797 people and 443 ex-East Timorese refugee families or 1,364 people.

INDONESIANS, EX-EAST TIMORESE HOPE JAPAN WOULD CONTINUE AID

January 20, 2004 8:38pm Antara

Atambua, E Nusa Tenggara, Jan 20 (ANTARA) - Indonesians and former East Timorese refugees living in Indonesia's East Nusa Tenggara province have expressed hope that Japan would continue to provide them assistance, a spokesman has said.

"Japan had provided assistance in the form of clean water facilities for Indonesians and former East Timorese refugees in 2002-03. They want the assistance to be continued," leader of former refugees living in a resettlement area here, Apolinario da Silva, said on Tuesday.

People living in areas near the border between East Nusa Tenggara and East Timor face water shortage during droughts, he said.

Da Silva said both Indonesians and former refugees hope that Japan would be ready to help them again by providing pipes and electric water pumps rather than clean water.

The people will set up the equipment using their own money, he said.

About 20,000 former East Timorese refugees have already moved from emergency camps to five resettlement areas without any clean water facility, he said.

East Nusa Tenggara shares a border with East Timor, which many East Timorese abandoned after the former Portuguese colony seceded from Indonesia in 1999 through a United Nations-administered ballot.

Indonesians living near the resettlement areas, da Silva said, always face water shortage during the dry season.

The Canadian government, through the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), set up a clean water network late in 2003 for 202 Indonesian families in Tulamalae subdistrict here, he said.

(THROUGH ASIA PULSE)

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