| Subject: East Timor
Independence Leaders to Meet Wahid also:
Mid-January Target for U.N. Peace Force in East Timor
East Timor independence leaders to meet Wahid
UNITED NATIONS, Nov 17 (Reuters) - Nobel peace prize winner
Jose Ramos-Horta said on Wednesday that he and East Timorese independence leader Xanana
Gusmao would meet Indonesia's new president in Jakarta on November 30.
``We are going to Jakarta, even before I finally return to
East Timor, to pay tribute to the wisdom and vision of (President) Abdurrahman Wahid and
begin the process of reconciliation and rebuilding of relations with that great country,
the Republic of Indonesia,'' Ramos-Horta said.
Calling Wahid ``my good friend,'' Ramos-Horta said the new
Indonesian leader was a ``man of great moral authority, something that was lacking in
Indonesia for many years.''
Ramos-Horta, expected to go home for the first time since
1974 on December 1, made the comments while accepting an award from the Hague Appeal for
Peace, a coalition of various groups that organised a conference in the Netherlands
capital in May, to call for the abolition of war in the new century.
Cora Weiss, a veteran American peace campaigner and
president of the Hague Appeal for Peace, said Ramos-Horta was honoured for his non-violent
struggle for East Timorese independence from Indonesia.
In 1996 he shared the Nobel Peace Prize with East Timor's
spiritual leader, Bishop Carlos Belo.
Jakarta invaded the former Portuguese colony in 1975 but
agreed to let it go after East Timorese on August 30 voted overwhelmingly for independence
in a U.N.-organised ballot.
Pro-Indonesian militias went on the rampage to protest the
vote before Australian-led troops entered the territory in mid-September to restore order.
Ramos-Horta, in his speech accepting the prize, noted that
U.S. ambassador Richard Holbrooke was leaving for a trip to Timor on Thursday. Holbrooke
and Assistant Secretary of State Stanley Roth are to visit East Timor, West Timor and
Jakarta before returning to the United States on November 24.
The United States has suspended military aid after
pro-Jakarta militia with ties to the Indonesian army killed, looted and burned to protest
the August 30 independence vote. They marched some 200,000 East Timorese to neighbouring
Indonesian West Timor and are still holding many of them.
Ramos-Horta has called for sanctions imposed on Indonesia
by individual countries to be lifted to help the new government but has asked the embargo
on weapons remain in place.
Reuters November 17, 1999
Mid-January Target for U.N. Peace Force in East
Timor
By Anthony Goodman
UNITED NATIONS — Mid-January is the best time for an
Australian-led peacekeeping force now in East Timor to hand off to a U.N. force, according
to a report circulated at the United Nations on Wednesday. The document was a periodic
report, submitted by Australia, on the activities of the international force hurriedly
deployed to East Timor in September.
That force, called INTERFET (International Force, East
Timor), was authorized by the U.N. Security Council to restore order after pro-Jakarta
militias went on a rampage of murder and destruction following an August 30 vote in favor
of independence from Indonesia.
The council voted on October 25 to replace it with the U.N.
Transitional Administration in East Timor (UNTAET), comprised of nearly 11,000 troops and
police along with thousands of civilian officials, to help lead the former Portuguese
colony to independence in two to three years. The council did not set a firm date for
UNTAET's deployment.
"With the continued success of INTERFET, conditions
are moving toward the point where the transition to a peacekeeping operation under UNTAET
can take place," the report said.
"Australia ... and the United Nations department of
peacekeeping operations have agreed that the preferred transition period is
mid-January," it said.
It said the Australian commander of INTERFET, Major-General
Peter Cosgrove, "advises that, on the basis of current and anticipated security
conditions, this date is reasonable."
Urging accelerated planning to assure a timely transition,
it said INTERFET would welcome the early deployment of the advance headquarters of the
U.N. peacekeeping operation and early discussions between UNTAET and INTERFET on the
conditions and requirements of the transition.
The early appointment of the senior leadership of UNTAET,
including its force commander, would also facilitate an early transition and assist U.N.
efforts to secure firm commitments of forces from contributing countries, the report said.
The Brazilian diplomat who will head the overall UNTAET
operation for at least six months, Under-Secretary-General Sergio Vieira de Mello, arrived
in Dili, the capital of East Timor, on Tuesday.
Philippines Foreign Secretary Domingo Siazon said in Manila
on Wednesday his country had been asked to nominate three Filipino candidates for the post
of commander of UNTAET's peacekeeping force. He said at least one other country had been
asked by Secretary-General Kofi Annan to nominate candidates for the post.
The Australian report said a transition early next year
"roughly accords with the resources available" from a trust fund that pays the
costs of INTERFET contingents not funded by their own governments.
"Delay beyond this period would necessitate additional
trust fund contributions. This further underscores the importance of an early
transition," the report said.
Unlike INTERFET, the costs of UNTAET will be apportioned
among all U.N. members and not covered primarily by the troop-contributing countries.
The Australian report said INTERFET had made
"significant progress in restoring peace and security throughout East Timor. INTERFET
had "successfully marginalized the militias and their capacity to threaten the safety
of the East Timorese people," it added, a reference to the pro-Indonesian groups
largely responsible for the violence.
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