Subject: SMH: Anxious watch on East Timor
Date: Sat, 17 Jul 1999 09:33:31 -0400
From: "John M. Miller" <fbp@igc.apc.org> Sydney Morning Herald
Saturday, July 17, 1999
ANALYSIS Anxious watch on East Timor
By SARAH CRICHTON
With voter registration for East Timor's historic ballot on independence or autonomy
under way yesterday, Australia and other interested countries will be watching to see how
Jakarta lives up to its promises to improve security in the violence-wracked province.
Regional diplomats say Canberra's repertoire of diplomatic messages, in particular, is
close to being exhausted. "Australia has played almost its entire hand," a
senior diplomat said this week.
This was emphasised unintentionally by the Foreign Minister, Mr Downer, with his
plaintive statements earlier in the week on the ABC's Lateline program, that Canberra had
made 50 representations over the past four months about Indonesia's tolerance and support
for the pro-integration militias - representations that Jakarta has, on the face of it,
ignored. Jakarta has been under intense pressure and scrutiny in the past two weeks: from
the United Nations, the United States, Australia and allied governments.
This week's visit to Dili by a Cabinet delegation was the result of heat being applied.
The outcome - some arrests of militia members over attacks on UN posts and guarantees of
free movement and access for UN staff - shows Jakarta may be moving to live up to its
promises under the May 5 accords. The next turning point will come half-way through the
20-day voter registration period when UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan makes another
assessment of security in East Timor. Should he decide Indonesia is still not meeting its
promises and announce another postponement of the vote, more difficult options will have
to be considered.
Australia has already sent Mr Howard, Mr Downer, and Defence Minister John Moore to
talk tough about the militias. What next? Probably our most senior military man, Admiral
Chris Barrie, would be sent for a tough talk with the Indonesian Defence Minister and
armed forces chief Wiranto.
So far, strategists have been reluctant to take this step, holding it in reserve for
the next difficult stage. "What happens the day after the vote?" asks one
diplomat, pointing to the likely problem of maintaining order when one side learns of
victory, the other defeat.
Canberra and other regional governments have been trying to get the three parties to
the May 5 agreement - Indonesia, Portugal and the UN - to consider this at talks which
resumed in New York yesterday. The senior diplomat said: "After the vote, the role of
an alert evacuation force phases out and instead you are looking at having a force ready
to deploy to keep peace. But you can only go when asked, and you need to go pronto,
otherwise you will be in the impossible situation of peace enforcing, which no-one
wants."
What has not been publicly spelled out, but presumably made plain to Indonesia, are the
threat of further sanctions, such as isolating its military from allied contacts, and
denial of economic assistance through international financial institutions.
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