Subject: Obs: Indonesian army talks peace but makes
war
Date: Sat, 01 May 1999 08:40:28 -0400
From: "John M. Miller" <fbp@igc.apc.org>Received from Joyo:
The Observer [UK] Sunday April 25, 1999
Army talks peace but makes war
The Indonesian army has sent death squads into East Timor, an attempt to crush the
independence movement.
John Aglionby reports in Ermera
East Timorese village chief Bartholomew Borromeu learnt the hard way that the
Indonesian army, despite imposing a peace agreement on the territory's warring factions
this week, is not interested in peace at all.
Having survived a torture session after being seized on his way home from church last
Sunday, Borromeu was arrested by soldiers again on Wednesday morning.
This was just as Indonesian armed forces commander General Wiranto was persuading the
leaders of factions loyal to Indonesia and their pro-independence counterparts to sign a
pact 'to end terrorism and violence' and 'work together to achieve an atmosphere of peace
and security in East Timor'.
While General Wiranto was preaching peace in the capital, Dili, his subordinates in the
district of Ermera, 40 miles to the south-west, were systematically beating Mr Borromeu to
death. 'His skull was completely smashed,' said Old Ermera's priest, Father Sancho Amaral.
There was no reason for the attack on Mr Borromeu, according to Father Sancho, 'except
that he was a local leader of the pro-independence National Council for East Timorese
Resistance (CNRT). It's all about intimidation.'
At least a dozen other innocent East Timorese have been killed since Mr Borromeu, in
various parts of the former Portuguese colony which Indonesia invaded in 1975. The
difference between their deaths and Mr Borromeu's is that they were killed by the militias
the Indonesian army has created since last November to wage a campaign of terror across
the territory to disrupt the United Nations-sponsored peace process.
The army has therefore been able to deny involvement in killings and maintain its
self-righteous public commitment to peace. But The Observer, the first news organisation
to visit Ermera since the terror began there, can expose that commitment as sham.
Ermera is a prosperous coffee-growing centre, one of the few thriving areas in a
territory Jakarta has mercilessly stripped of its wealth. There are practically none of
the destitute villages found elsewhere in East Timor and, because of the coffee, few of
the impoverished people the army has found to be such willing militia recruits.
'We all here reject the Red and White Iron, the Thorn and the other militias,' Ermera
regent, Constantino Soares, said. 'It is my job to look after the people and keep the
peace.'
Soares denies there is any tension in the area and says only 11 people have been killed
in the district since last September. 'Most were victims of the pro-independence
guerrillas,' he maintains.
But like all civilian officials in East Timor, he is just a puppet for the military;
the public face to cover up what is really going on. The truth is that in the last two
weeks the military has begun a vicious campaign of terror in Ermera.
'People are being taken away every day to be interrogated and beaten,' Father Sancho
said. 'They have to move around every night and no one can discuss anything in the open.'
There have been two prongs to the army's strategy. The first, to spark widespread fear
across the whole area, was to massacre a number of people in the remote village of
Talimoro. 'We know at least six people were killed there,' one bus driver said. 'But
everyone is too afraid to go and find out what really happened.' Other sources say the
toll could be as high as a dozen.
That was two weeks ago. Since then at least seven other people have been killed in
Ermera. The army is picking off CNRT leaders to crush the people's pro-independence
movement ahead of the referendum on the territory's sovereignty, due in July.
First to die was local councillor Antonio da Lima. He was shot by the army in the
market in the village of Gleno. The military claims he tried to throw a grenade at
soldiers on patrol. Eye-witnesses say he was shot in cold blood.
Two days later, two more CNRT members were killed and, two days after that, another two
people. 'All were killed by soldiers or the East Timorese territorial troops,' Father
Sancho said.
Father Sancho, who says the current terror is the worst in his two and a half years in
Ermera, has tried to plead with the local army commander. 'Every time I go and see him he
says he will do something, but then does nothing.'
The military declined to comment on the situation in Ermera, beyond admitting that
there had been trouble and that 'one or two people have died recently'. But it is clear
they do not believe in their own peace agreement.
When the military commander of Dili, Colonel Tono Suratman, visited Ermera on Friday,
he was accompanied by a van of heavily armed police and two trucks full of soldiers in
combat gear. Everyone in what is a strongly anti-Indonesian area is also flying the
Indonesian flag. 'Officials came here two weeks ago and told us to do so,' the stallholder
said. 'Considering what's going on, it's the safest thing to do.'
With the peace process continuing in New York, it is doubtful the terror campaign will
achieve its short-term goal of cancelling the independence ballot. Judging by people's
opinions in Ermera, the long-term goal of coercing support of continued Indonesian rule is
also doomed.
'We've had terror and intimidation for 23 years,' CNRT leader David Ximenes said.
• East Timorese villagers in southern Suai, about 120 miles southwest of Dili,
pulled rotting corpses from the ocean yesterday after new attacks by pro-Jakarta militia.
Human rights workers said the final death toll from last week's killing could top 100.
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