Karen Polglaze, Dili – East Timor's armed resistance force Falintil for the first time overnight engaged in a shoot-out with a pro-integration paramilitary force, a Catholic source said today.

The three hour shoot-out was the result of a surprise attack by the Halilintar paramilitary group on a secret meeting of Falintil guerrillas, the source said.

The Halilintar numbered at least 50 personnel armed with guns. A few thousand others armed with traditional weapons such as bows and arrow and knives were operating in the region, the source said.

The shoot-out follows a series of violent events in the area around Maliana, west of the capital, Dili, which have left four people dead, including two children, and four others injured.

The source said that the pro-integration paramilitary was being passed information by an ABRI (Indonesian military) intelligence unit known as SGI.

"The SGI – they are the ones who are aware of the situation on the ground and keep under observation all the activities of Falintil," the source said.

"They then passed this information to the military and to the militias." near Maliana, after an incident where a man accused of helping to transport Falintil members to the mountains was on Monday night taken from his house by a group of fully-armed ABRI officers who beat him and took him to the local military command post, the source said. The man, Jose Andrade Lecruz, has not been seen since.

Catholic relief organisation Caritas today sent 300 kilograms of US-grown rice and some medical supplies to Lahomea to help the local polyclinic cope with the influx of refugees.