Darwin – A Dutch journalist shot dead in East Timor was probably killed by Indonesian troops, an Australian coroner said yesterday.
Northern Territory coroner Mr Greg Cavanagh was handing down his findings from an investigation into the killing of Mr Sander Robert Thoenes, 30, whose mutilated body was found in the East Timorese capital Dili on September 22.
Kupang – The real losers in East Timor's tumultuous transition to independence from Indonesia, the pro-Jakarta militias and their supporters, met at a rundown hotel here Wednesday to decide what to do now.
Associated Press in Dili – Gangs of youths wielding machetes and clubs rioted on Tuesday in Dili's main marketplace, seriously injuring at least four people, eyewitnesses said.
Dario Agnote – With a pack of Australian-made apricot jam and some bread she picked up from a heap of thrash, Margarita Pereira, a skinny 8-year-old, and her eight siblings hurry back home.
For the first time, Pereira said she and her brothers and sisters will be able to taste the dark-colored sandwich spread.
Dili – East Timor will adopt the US dollar as its official currency under United Nations rule, a senior member of the National Council for Timorese Resistance (CNRT) told Reuters on Monday.
The decision has angered the CNRT, the main political organisation representing the Timorese, which lobbied strongly for the Portuguese escudo.
John Martinkus, Dili – The Nobel Peace laureate Mr Jose Ramos Horta has blamed the Indonesian military for the militia border incursions that have seen Australian troops under fire in the past week.
Marian Wilkinson and Peter Cole-Adams – Australia would consider a request to hand over classified intelligence material to the Indonesian human rights inquiry investigating war crimes in Timor, the Foreign Minister, Mr Downer, said.
Linda Tenenbaum – Four months after the Australian-led military occupation of East Timor, the United Nations is establishing a colonial-style administration in the former Indonesian territory. Already, its callous indifference to the plight of the local population is fuelling growing resentment.
Ray Brindal, Canberra – Australia and East Timor stand to reap hundreds of millions of dollars in royalties if oil and natural gas projects in the zone of cooperation in the Timor Sea proceed, an East Timorese spokesman said Thursday.
John Martinkus, Dili – Pro-Indonesian militia challenged the authority of Australian troops in the East Timorese enclave of Oecussi this morning, the fifth time in the past three days.
The clashes with the militia, including one this week in which militiamen were wounded and one reportedly killed, have baffled the Australian-led Interfet UN peacekeeping force.
Tensions are rising as the rebuilding of East Timor begins, Conor O'Clery writes from Dili.
Conor O'Clery, East Timor – The electricity power station in Los Palos, a remote town on the eastern plains of East Timor, survived the devastation wrought on the former Portuguese colony by pro-Indonesian forces in September. All it lacked was diesel fuel.
Jon Land – The low wages that workers receive in East Timor today are little different from the pre-referendum rate, but given the dramatic increase in food and basic commodity prices since then, East Timorese can afford to purchase only a fraction of what they could previously.
Sam King, Dili – The stated aim of the United Nations Transitional Administration in East Timor (UNTAET) is to effectively administer the country during the period of transition to a popularly elected government.
Jakarta – Indonesia on Monday urged the United Nations to give Jakarta the chance to complete its own inquiry into atrocities in East Timor before stepping up international action.
Canberra – The commander of the multinational peacekeeping force in East Timor said Monday that he had issued a warning to his troops after a group of women complained of sexual harassment.
Ian Timberlake, Dili – East Timor's leadership plans to start paying volunteer public servants as part of measures to ease growing frustration over the lack of progress since Indonesian rule ended.
The National Consultative Council (NCC) has also agreed to create a central fiscal authority which will be the foundation for a finance ministry.
Three people have been injured in Dili during violent scuffles when thousands of poor and unemployed East Timorese scrambled to apply for jobs offered by the United Nations administration.
They were frustrated their applications for about 2,000 available positions had been rejected. When the UN recently advertised the positions it received 9,000 applications.
United Nations civilian police have arrested a pro-Indonesian militiaman implicated in one of the first mass murders in East Timor last year.
A spokesman for the UN Transitional Administration in East Timor, Mr Refik Hodzic, said yesterday that a man had been arrested at his home in Liquica on Monday over murders committed in April last year.
Dili – A number of pro-Indonesian militiamen and members of their families were attacked when they tried to return to their homes in East Timor, a UN official said Friday.
Several people were injured in fights with their neighbors in recent days, said Paul Stromberg, spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.
Jakarta – Over 400 East Timorese who fled their violence-ravaged homeland following the August 30 self-determination ballot have died from various diseases in their refugee camps throughout West Timor in Indonesia.
John Martinkus, Kupang – Exiled pro-Indonesian militia leader Eurico Gutteres who was widely blamed for the destruction of Dili wants to negotiate a return to East Timor for himself and his men.
"I want to return but it's not that easy," Gutteres told AAP from a safe house in Kupang, West Timor, where the leader of the feared Aitarak militia is planning his next move.
Dili – A piece of cardboard torn from a Tiger beer carton covers the small beef satays (kebabs) to help them smoke on Emilio Gomes' grill.
They used to sell for 300 rupiah (40 cents) each stick but a 66 percent price hike has pushed the cost to 500 rupiah a skewer.
Associated Press, Baucau – Gang warfare has broken out in East Timor's second largest city leaving several people injured, UN officials said on Tuesday.
For the past two weeks, gangs of youths have fought pitched battles in Baucau, 110km west of the capital, Dili, vying for control of city's streets, said Sergey Lashin, chief of the UN's police force in East Timor.
Andrew West – An Australian Federal Police officer could face charges after revealing the truth about the bloodbath in East Timor to Australia's Parliament.
Carmel Egan, Dili – Murder, rape and torture erupted on the East Timorese capital's streets as soon as the historic referendum was declared a victory for independence on September 4, and the killing and looting continued even after Australian-led Interfet troops arrived on September 20.
Annie White: A top East Timorese official has accused Australian aid groups and businesses of profiteering in East Timor. The secretary-general of Timor's socialist party Avelino De Silva sits alongside Xanana Gusmao and Jose Ramos Horta at the National Consultative Council, Timor's de facto government.
Sam de Silva, Dili – About 400 people marched Wednesday from the office of protest organsier, the Socialist Party of Timor (PST) to the gates of the UNTAET headquarters to protest for the rights of the East Timorese people. The PST are linked to and supported by the Australian-based Democratic Socialist Party.
Joanne Collins, Dili – East Timor is likely to count Indonesia, its old and often brutal master, as its top trade partner as the devastated fledgling nation strives to rebuild, the United Nations and World Bank say.
Jakarta – Human rights activists have slammed the latest testimony made by Major General Zacky Anwar Makarim on the violence that destroyed about 70% of East Timor's infrastructure last year after the territory in August voted overwhelmingly to split from Indonesia.
Dili – In the first serious protest against the UN administration running East Timor, some 200 unemployed laborers demonstrated Wednesday against the use of Indonesian workers by companies contracted by the world body.
Keith B. Richburg, Dili – At one of the two new floating hotels in Dili last week, it was standing room only at the upper-deck bar.
Agencies in Jakarta and Dili – A senior Indonesian army general admitted yesterday that pro-Jakarta militias and some disgruntled Indonesian soldiers had committed murder and arson in East Timor.
John Martinkus, Memo – Local residents here on the East-West Timor border remain terrified of an Indonesian attack following this week's shooting incident between Indonesian troops and Australian Interfet soldiers.
[Source: Sydney Morning Herald - January 2, 2000]
Table of contents
Terry Townsend – The streets of what is left of Dili, the capital of East Timor, were packed on October 31, 1999, as tens of thousands of people joined a procession led by Catholic Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo.
Dili – Several dozen Muslims who fled the recent violence in East Timor returned home to a protest by East Timorese who said they are not welcome, a UN official said Friday.
Dili – East Timor's leader Xanana Gusmao said here Friday that he foresaw the territory obtaining full independence in at most two years – a year less than currently envisaged.
Dili – East Timor's independence leader Jose Alexandre "Xanana" Gusmao said Friday that East Timor will be the first new independent nation of the new millennium, but not with him as president.
Gusmao has been widely regarded as the main contender for the presidency when East Timor, now under UN administration, becomes independent.
Keith B. Richburg, Tuapukan Refugee Camp – Zelia Soares and her family had decided to go home, to leave this refugee camp in western Timor and take their chances in the newly independent East Timor.
Jakarta – A former battalion commander in East Timor admitted on Thursday that his troops ambushed two foreign journalists in the territory's capital of Dili on September 21.
Jakarta – Former Indonesian armed forces chief General Wiranto on Friday told a human rights commission there had been no plan or policy for either a genocide or crimes against humanity in East Timor.
Jakarta – Efforts to bring to justice those behind the violence in East Timor received a double blow this week with the former armed forces chief rebuffing a domestic inquiry and the government again rejecting an international tribunal.
Railako – There was not much left of body number 258, but a team of UN civilian police officers and soldiers from the International Force for East Timor (Interfet) set out Thursday to find as much as they could.
Dili – Seven people were wounded after a suspected member of a pro-Indonesian militia threw a hand grenade in the border area between East and West Timor, a spokesman for the international peace force here said.
Canberra – More than 100,000 refugees in West Timor were trapped in makeshift camps and living in a state of constant fear under the rule of the militia groups that destroyed East Timor, an Amnesty International report said today.
Keith B. Richburg, Dili – Australian troops in East Timor are examining a newly discovered grave site in the Oe-Cussi enclave that may contain the remains of as many as 50 victims of last September's bloody rampage by Indonesian army troops and allied militias, which followed the territory's overwhelming vote to secede from Indonesia.
Geneva – More than 119,000 East Timorese have now returned to the territory – most of them from Indonesian West Timor, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees said here Tuesday. With the exception of three minor incidents since Friday, UNHCR staff had also reported an easing of conditions in some militia-controlled camps in West Timor, spokesman Paul Stromberg said.
Kupang – A pro-Jakarta East Timor militia chief accused the Indonesian government on Friday of abandoning its own supporters, but said he would not disband his group, which is accused of terror in the territory.
Atambua – One week after the commander of pro-Indonesian militias ordered his forces to disband, militias remain present here but their power is fading, aid workers say.