A former pro-Indonesian militia member has received a 16-year sentence from the Special Panel for Serious Crimes in Dili.

Jill Jolliffe, Dili – United Nations officials are challenging Indonesia's stand on East Timor war crimes.

Tom Fawthrop and Paul Harris – Formally recognising the continued security threats to East Timor, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said on 26 July: "There is concern that some militia el

Ian Timberlake, Dili – Sister Erminia somehow survived the volley of rifle fire that tore into her van at a militia roadblock two years ago.

Mark Dodd, Tumin – On a barren ridge just outside the village of Tumin, hundreds gathered last weekend to commemorate one of the most shocking mass murders that occurred in the violence

Jakarta – In a gesture of reconciliation, East Timor's independence hero Xanana Gusmao welcomed home the families of former pro-Jakarta militiamen Friday as mass refugee returns resumed

Vaudine England – The barefoot children were scrambling up the bougainvillea bushes to gather fresh clusters of the flowers – the only bright spot in the dry, dusty and still-devastated

Lindsay Murdoch, Dili – Nobel Peace Prize-winner Bishop Carlos Belo has made a new appeal to the international community to establish a war crimes tribunal to punish Indonesian military

[Speaking for the first time, former Indonesian president B.J.

Mark Dodd, Dili – Those responsible for some of the worst atrocities committed in East Timor in 1999 are likely to escape prosecution by a special Indonesian war crimes tribunal, accord

East Timor's UN Transition Administration (UNTAET) praised Monday the weapons collection campaign conducted last week by the Indonesian Armed Forces and targeting militias in Jakarta's

Ian Timberlake, Jakarta – The Indonesian military directed a militia campaign of killings, terror and forced deportation against East Timorese civilians, according to a new book on the

Mark Dodd in Dili and Craig Skehan in Canberra – An East Timorese militia leader who served in the Indonesian Army's special forces and is on trial for war crimes – including the murder

Mark Dodd, Maliana – Every day a group of women meet at the shop called Nove Nove (Nine Nine) in bustling Maliana market. They share a chilling legacy.

Kupang – Police forcibly evacuated some 500 former prointegration militiamen from East Timor on Tuesday.

Mark Dodd – A court holding the territory's first war crimes trial heard graphic evidence yesterday about the torture and murder of a pro-independence guerilla by Indonesian special for

Mark Dodd – East Timorese officials have hailed President Megawati Sukarnoputri's decision to expand the terms of an Indonesian tribunal investigating violence in East Timor in 1999.

[Excerpt from report by Asih Nurhayati by Indonesian Satunet news web site on 6 August.]

[Source: Kompas Cyber Media web site, Jakarta, Auguse 3]

An Indonesian military commander has ordered his troops to arrest East Timorese militiamen who are still operating from refugee camps in neighbouring West Timor, the official Antara new

Yogyakarta – Some fifty members from East Timorese prointegration groups held a modest ceremony on Tuesday at Yogyakarta's East Timor Students Dormitory to celebrate what they called "t

A Defensive Alexander Downer undoubtedly has his eyes on the history books with the publication of the Government's apologia for its handling of the East Timor crisis.

Don Greenlees, Jakarta – Seated in a conference room of the Sheraton Nusa Dua Hotel in Bali, an agitated Indonesian president B.J. Habibie thumped his fist on the table.

Craig Skehan – An official history of Australia's role in East Timor's transition to independence reveals that the Federal Government knew more than it was willing to admit at the time

Tony Kevin – Tomorrow, Alexander Downer launches a book on Australia's role in East Timor between 1998 and 2000. One wonders why he should wish to reopen this Pandora's box.

Mark Dodd, Dili – Indonesian security forces have arrested 23 hardcore militiamen including the notorious leader of the gang involved in the 1999 massacre in East Timor's Suai cathedral

Mark Dodd, Saburai village – After leaving the squalor of a refugee camp in West Timor, one of militia leader Victor Lopes's first acts on returning to his mountain village was to regis

[This is an exclusive extract from "Appeasing Jakarta: Australia's Complicity in the East Timor Tragedy", the second in the Quarterly Essay series published by Black Inc., Melbourne,

The first major trial of atrocities committed in East Timor by Indonesian forces and proxy militias got underway in Dili Tuesday, with a three-judge panel hearing preliminary issues beh

A group of presumed anti-independence militiamen opened fire Thursday on a patrol of UN peacekeepers in the East Timorese district of Maliana, near the border with Indonesia.

Hamish McDonald – Indonesian submarines and combat aircraft shadowed so closely ships carrying Australian and New Zealand troops into East Timor in 1999 that escorting warships went ont

A security operation conducted by United Nations peacekeepers in East Timor has resulted in the surrender of 34 suspected militia members in the eastern part of the territory, the UN Tr

Marianne Kearney, Jakarta – The thousands of East Timorese still languishing in West Timor's camps are not free to choose to return to home as they have been intimidated by pro-Indonesi

Lindsay Murdoch, Jakarta – The East Timorese militia leader Eurico Guterres has been freed 23 days after an Indonesian court jailed him for six months.

Andrew West – Australian Government officials have been accused of burying a crucial intelligence report about a 1998 Indonesian massacre in the West Papua town of Biak because it did n

Canberra – Administrative action is being taken against two defence personnel following high profile document leak investigations.

Seth Mydans, Jakarta – A strange red banner hangs over the gate of one of the middle-class villas on a quiet street in central Jakarta: "Am I really a criminal for defending the red and

Mark Davis – In September 1999, the Australian Army stepped into the carnage of East Timor as the lead contributor in the international force INTERFET.

Scott Burchill – Given advance notice that the street bully is about to beat up your neighbour, three courses of action are open to you.

The Australian government knew about Indonesian military plans to massacre East Timor independence supporters in 1999 and thought clever diplomacy could prevent it, a former member of t

Jill Jollife, Dariwn – An Australian Army intelligence officer who served in East Timor has accused the Federal Government of concealing vital evidence on Indonesian army and militia wa

[In an extraordinary investigation, reporter Mark Davis returns to East Timor to disclose disturbing new revelations about Australia's secret intelligence information prior to the co

Fifteen militia commanders on Saturday accepted the 30 August 1999 referendum result, because it was, as they said, the decision of the majority.

Lindsay Murdoch, Jakarta – The notorious East Timorese militia leader Eurico Guterres will be free within weeks after a Jakarta court yesterday sentenced him to six months' jail for inc

Hamish McDonald – A secret report for the Indonesian Government makes it clear that its military directed the militia violence against East Timor's independence vote and that top genera

[The Timor massacres were planned in detail: the guns, the trucks, the burial sites.

Lindsay Murdoch, Jakarta – Key people accused of complicity in the bloodshed in East Timor are set to escape prosecution because of the bungled wording of a decree issued this week by I

Devi Asmarani, Atambua – Weapons are valued treasures in this border town that has 63,000 East Timorese refugees, and there is always an interested buyer – the Indonesian military.

Devi Asmarani, Atambua – Tension is running high in this border town 2 1/2 years after the influx of over 200,000 East Timorese who fled the post-ballot violence in their homeland.

Sydney – Nobel peace laureate Bishop Carlos Belo of East Timor appealed Monday for an international tribunal to punish crimes against humanity in his country and help the fledgling nati