Washington – The United States said on Friday it saw "promising prospects" for Indonesia's domestic investigation into atrocities in East Timor last year. But if the Indonesian judicial system failed to deliver credible justice, the international community would have to take on the task, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright told a seminar for editors on war crimes.

Indonesian Attorney-General Marzuki Darusman has set up a 64- strong team to investigate the violence which swept East Timor after it voted for independence last year. The United Nations has welcomed general progress by Indonesia.

Albright said: "The [Indonesian] team wasted no time in bringing in several top generals for questioning. The prospects are promising for a credible and effective domestic accountability process that hardliners cannot dismiss as a Western-imposed, politically motivated version of victors' justice," she added.

The investigation is into killings by militias opposed to independence for East Timor, a former Portuguese colony invaded by Indonesia in 1975, and possible assistance to the militias by elements of the Indonesian military. The territory is now under UN administration in preparation for independence in about two years.

Albright said: "The bottom line is that those responsible for orchestrating this blood bath must be brought to justice. If the Indonesian judicial system is capable of delivering credible justice, so much the better. "If that is not ultimately the case, the international community can and should exert its prerogatives to see that the perpetrators are brought to justice."