Jakarta – Pro-Indonesia militiamen and troops killed at least 17 people, wounding dozens more, in an attack Monday on an East Timorese village near Liquiga, a resistance spokesman told Lusa.

David Ximenes, a representative of the National Council for Timorese Resistance (CNRT), said fresh news reaching Dili brought word the attack had caused many more casualties than first reported. Casualty figures could continue rising, he added.

He said militiamen and troops were "firing indiscriminantly" on civilians in the village of Mauboke, who only had knives for their defense.

Ximenes urged the international community "to pressure" the United Nations "to come to East Timor" to quell escalating violence between pro-and anti-independence supporters.

The streets of Dili, he added, were filled with armed militamen who were threatening CNRT officials and pro-independence supporters.

UN representative suggests East Timor security zones

Australian Associated Press - April 4, 1999 (abridged)

Karen Polglaze, Jakarta – A United Nations representative has suggested creating security zones in East Timor as a senior aid worker warned that people working with refugees were being targeted and their lives threatened.

As political positions harden in the lead-up to a mid-year UN-supervised ballot on the future of the disputed territory, the level of violence has increased.

Jailed East Timorse resistance leader Jose Xanana Gusmao warned of a bloodbath if pro-integrationist militias were not disarmed and said the UN police force he previously advocated would no longer be able to cope with the situation and that a full-fledged peacekeeping force will be needed.

Refugees fleeing violence and seeking shelter in churches and safe house now numbered about 7,000 across the province, a senior aid worker visiting Dili said.

"The problem we have is how to get humanitarian aid to these people who have no home, no food and no shelter," the aid worker said.

"At present, the [Catholic] church is filling the gap, but everybody who is identified as being somebody who is trying to help is being targeted. Anybody who is trying to assist them, including nuns, is being threatened."

The aid worker, who did not wish to be identified, joined the increasingly loud calls for a UN peacekeeping force to be sent into East Timor as soon as possible.

UNICEF area representative for Indonesia and Malaysia Stephen Woodhouse said there were serious concerns over access to health care, especially now that many doctors had been among the thousands of Indonesians who had left the province fearing further violence.

A UN humanitarian mission was due to assess the situation in the territory to compile a report for a meeting between senior officials of Indonesia and former colonial power Portugal to take place in New York on April 13 under the auspices of the UN.

"We need to agree on standard operating procedures, corridors of access and zones of security as soon as possible," Woodhouse told AAP.

"Facilities and trained staff are worse in East Timor than anywhere else in Indonesia. But the big issue here is the security issue."