Deborah Snow – Charges are understood to have been laid against a former senior soldier in the Special Air Service after a long investigation into allegations of serious misconduct by members of the elite unit in East Timor.

Australia's Immigration Minister Phillip Ruddock has been asked to establish a special visa category in a bid to allow a group of East Timorese to stay in the country.

The special visa would apply to about 18-hundred East Timorese asylum seekers who are facing deportation.

Jakarta – Former foreign minister Ali Alatas said on Wednesday that the offer of secession from Indonesia to the East Timorese in the UN-organized ballot in August 1999 was a "premature" decision of (former) president B.J.Habibie's government.

Tiarma Siboro, Jakarta – Noted religious leaders grouped in the National Moral Movement (GMN) called on the government to halt the East Timor human rights trials, claiming that they were politically motivated.

East Timorese asylum seekers have a special case to be allowed to stay in Australia.

Jakarta – A former Indonesian military chief for East Timor said Monday he tried to prevent massacres in East Timor in September 1999 and that none of his own men were involved.

"None of the witnesses who were heard in court said that the TNI [the armed forces] was involved in the attacks," Colonel Noer Muis told a human rights court.

Zakki Hakim, Jakarta – A coalition of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) will use the occasion of the annual meeting of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR) in Geneva next month to press for international intervention in the ongoing East Timor human rights trials.

Yemris Fointuna, Kupang – West Timorese people have demanded the United Nations to revoke a security status imposed on the province after a mob killed three UN humanitarian workers in 2000, saying it was keeping away aid workers, tourists and foreign investors.

Jill Jolliffe, Dili – A small group of East Timorese ex-prisoners listens, transfixed, to the text of the UN's 1987 Convention on Torture.

For the first time they learn that the people who tortured them are considered criminals. The listeners break into broad smiles and give thumbs-up signals.

Paul Toohey – Critically needed containers of medical, health and school supplies have been stockpiled on Dili's wharf because of heavy smuggling and what East Timorese-based aid workers say is suspicion of Australia's motives.

Jakarta – Former Indonesian military chief General Wiranto on Thursday defended his record over East Timor's bloody 1999 breakaway from Jakarta, saying he had helped prevent a civil war there.

Royal Abbott, Melbourne – Five Melbourne mayors have joined the Victorian government in appealing to Canberra to halt plans to forcibly deport 1,400 East Timorese who have been denied permanent residency.

Many of the East Timorese have lived legally in Australia for 10 years and have established roots they are unwilling to sever to return to their once-troubled homeland.

Canberra – The United Nations and Australia agreed it was too early to withdraw peacekeepers from East Timor after riots in December but its police must be strengthened so they can take over from troops, Prime Minister John Howard said.

Stephen Steele, Washington – More than three years after East Timor voted for independence, access to adequate health care, education and basic human rights remains out of reach for most people in the country, said an East Timorese human rights worker.

Dili – The commander of Australian UN peacekeepers in East Timor has dismissed reports that former anti-independence militiamen have infiltrated from Indonesia and were behind recent attacks on Timorese villages.

John Ward and Peter Symonds – The Australian government is deliberately delaying the signing of an agreement with East Timor, known as the Timor Sea Treaty, as a means of blackmailing the small, newly independent country into conceding a greater share of off-shore oil and gas reserves to Canberra.

The UN Special Crimes Unit in East Timor has charged former militia commander, Joao Tavares, and four Indonesian TNI, or military, officers for atrocities in the territory before and after a UN sponsored vote for independence from Indonesia in August 1999. They are among 32 people, including 15 TNI soldiers, accused of murder, torture, persecution and other crimes.

Jill Jolliffe, Dili – United Nations investigators have indicted ageing militia chieftain Joao Tavares and two senior Indonesian officers for crimes against humanity committed in the Maliana district of East Timor in 1999.

Ralf Scharmann, Darwin – Traditional owners in several Top End communities have offered sanctuary to 84 Darwin-based East Timorese asylum seekers who are facing deportation.

Marie Munkara, traditional owner of Cape Fourcroy on Bathurst Island has opposed the government's attempt to deport the East Timorese.

Jakrta – Indonesian prosecutors demanded on Wednesday that the former military chief in East Timor be jailed for 10 years for failing to halt massacres when the territory voted to split from Jakarta rule in 1999.

Sarah Crichton – The Federal Court has ruled it cannot hear a US oil company's multi-billion dollar compensation claim against the Commonwealth for loss of rights to vast oil and gas reserves in the Timor Sea.

To East Timor, where a reported militia insurgency has put a spotlight on Australia's peacekeeping efforts in properly securing the border. Local authorities say they're struggling to repel fresh militia raids from West Timor, prompting calls for a tougher Australian stance on border security.

Jakarta – The UN on Tuesday indicted 32 people- including 15 Indonesian soldiers – for murdering and torturing East Timorese during the country's bloody break with Indonesia in 1999.

It was the largest indictment so far by the UN Special Crimes Unit and accuses Indonesian officers of crimes against humanity for taking part in the violence.

Karen Michelmore, Darwin – Players in the multi-billion dollar Timor Gas treaty are hopeful of an outcome within weeks, as negotiations drag on.

Northern Territory Chief Minister Clare Martin today said she was confident the federal government would soon ratify a treaty with East Timor on sharing royalties from the project.

Jill Jolliffe, Hatolia – The United Nations is in a quandary after insecure border villagers demanded that it extend a controversial military operation that has resulted in mass arrests.

Jill Jolliffe, Dili – The United Nations' police chief in East Timor is refusing to resign despite criticism from Fretilin government officials over his handling of riots in December.

"I'm not a quitter, and the UN wants me to stay, so I'm staying," Commissioner Peter Miller said.

Vannessa Hearman, Melbourne – Fivo Freitas is 28 years old, he sought asylum in Australia after leaving East Timor in 1999. Now he is preparing for his application for asylum-seeker status to be rejected once again by the Refugee Review Tribunal.

Lisbon – The Bishop of Dili called Wednesday for the creation of an independent body to oversee the exploitation of Timor Sea oil reserves, the Portuguese news agency Lusa reported.

"The oil is under the Timor Sea, it belongs to everybody and everybody has the right to know what is at stake. That is democracy and transparency," Bishop Ximenes Belo told the agency.

M. Taufiqurrahman, Jakarta – A human rights watchdog on Tuesday denounced the government for poorly handling the ad hoc tribunal for human rights violations in East Timor, saying that the trials were a complete failure.

David Fickling – The spectacle of someone large and powerful picking on a weak and desperate neighbour passes as bullying in the average playground. International politics, however, has a better name for it: diplomacy.

Jill Jolliffe, Dili – Members of an armed militia group arrested here last week say they agreed to return as guerillas because Indonesian officials in West Timor had prevented them from returning legally with United Nations refugee programs.

John Martinkus – Almost three weeks after a series of militia incursions into East Timor from neighbouring Indonesia left five people dead, the two largest contingents of the peacekeeping force (PKF) responsible for security in the newly independent nation, the Australians and the Portuguese, are still facing criticism over their failure to heed warnings of the attacks.

Jakarta – Father Raphael dos Santos, an East Timorese priest, said on Thursday Indonesian Military soldiers and policemen were among the attackers of his refugee-packed church in the town of Liquica in April 1999.

Jill Jolliffe, Dili – President Xanana Gusmao has denied a report that East Timor is seeking increased Australian military involvement in the territory to curb militia infiltrations from West Timor.

"We have been very happy with the performance of the peacekeepers," he said. "We don't need more Australian soldiers. They are needed for the war in Iraq; it's more important."

Jakarta – Timor Leste faces the worst threat to its stability since independence as security forces counter raids by armed gangs from Indonesia's West Timor.

Militiamen, who murdered six villagers early this month, have infiltrated the nation – known formerly as East Timor – with the aim of destabilising it, a government official said yesterday.

John Kerin and Terry Plane – East Timorese Foreign Minister Jose Ramos Horta wants Australia's UN peacekeepers to be involved in joint operations with the East Timor Defence Force to combat Indonesian military-backed militia raids on the fledgling country.

The Army's elite Special Forces (Kopassus) is reportedly behind recent incursions into East Timor by militia fighters.

A leaked United Nations report alleges that gangs armed and supported by Kopassus have been entering East Timor and threatening to kill villagers and community leaders who oppose them, the Australian Broadcastingting Corporation said Wednesday.

East Timor's Foreign Minister, Jose Ramos Horta, has warned that the United Nations peacekeepers stationed in the new nation are not managing to control border raids into East Timor by pro-Indonesian militia, and that the Australian Government and the United Nations have been slow to take the threat seriously.

Transcript:

Jill Jolliffe, Atsabe – The hamlet of Tiarlelo is only a few kilometres from Atsabe, itself 25 kilometres from the border with West Timor, but the rough jungle track that leads to it emphasises its isolation.

Moch. N. Kurniawan, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta Former Dili police chief Lt. Col. Hulman Gultom was sentenced to three years in prison on Monday by a human rights court for crimes against humanity in East Timor in 1999.

However, like previous convicts, he remained free pending an appeal with the High Court.

East Timorese President Xanana Gusmao said yesterday that it may be necessary to extend the mandate of the 5,000-soldier UN peacekeeping force in East Timor beyond June 2004, its scheduled end, in light of continued instability on the island.

Mark Dodd, Darwin – Southeast Asia's poorest country, East Timor, could get its first royalty payments from the oil- and gas-rich Timor Sea by 2004, money which experts say will mean the difference between aid dependency and economic self-sufficiency for the troubled half-island nation.

Matthew Moore, Jakarta – Some of the 28,000 East Timorese who remain in West Timor after fleeing the carnage that followed East Timor's 1999 vote for independence will soon be leaving the island altogether.

Dili – Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri is studying a possible restructuring of East Timor's government ministries to improve their functioning and the performance of ministers, official sources said Thursday.

The Indonesian government made only half-hearted attempts during the year to hold accountable those responsible for TNI abuses in East Timor. Human rights defenders inside and outside the country called for an international tribunal in light of the failures of the Indonesian justice system.

Dili – The atmosphere of instability looming over East Timor is leading to a deterioration of relations between national and UN security structures.

Dili – A captured former anti-independence militiaman has told interrogators in Dili that at least seven armed groups infiltrated East Timor from Indonesia in December, according to two reports obtained by Lusa Tuesday.

Tom Hyland – The accused sits with his seven lawyers in the listless heat of a Jakarta courtroom. He occasionally wipes his brow and shifts in his seat but mostly he is straight-backed, gazing with a soldier's practised stare into the middle distance. Major-General Tono Suratman, former Indonesian army commander in East Timor, seems bored.

Australia's foreign minister Alexander Downer has meet his East Timorese counterpart, Jose Ramos Horta, to discuss recent unrest in the developing nation.

Four people were killed recently when a gang armed with automatic rifles stormed villages in East Timor. It was the worst violence in the country since 1999.

Dili – East Timor police said Thursday they arrested two former pro-Jakarta militiamen on weapons charges but declined to say if the men were linked to a recent surge in violence in the newly independent country.