Malcolm Brown – The Federal Government was accused yesterday of obstructing efforts by the International Commission of Jurists to obtain evidence from East Timorese evacuees in Australia about atrocities committed in their country.
The NSW Director of Public Prosecutions, Mr Nicholas Cowdery, QC, speaking as national co-ordinator of the East Timor Evidence Project for the ICJ, said people wanting to get access to the evacuees at safe havens in NSW, Victoria and Western Australia had been blocked.
The Minister for Immigration, Mr Ruddock, had written to the president of the ICJ's Australian Section, Justice John Dowd, saying task force members who wished to speak to the East Timorese evacuees would not be allowed to enter the safe havens for that purpose.
In a letter dated November 12, Mr Ruddock wrote: "I appreciate the genuine desire to assist the United Nations of the ICJ and the eminence of many of the jurists involved but without UN accreditation it would be inappropriate for the Government to facilitate access to people in safe havens by any organisation.
"However, members of the committee would not be prevented from speaking to the East Timorese at the express initiation of the East Timorese evacuees themselves. Naturally, East Timorese in the havens are free to come and go as they please.
"This approach is a balanced one. On the one hand, assist proper investigation of crimes against humanity and, on the other, maintaining the freedom of the East Timorese in havens and protecting the rights of people likely to have been traumatised by the experience."
Mr Cowdery said yesterday: "The Government is intent on establishing normal relationships with Indonesia and not willing to assist in any activity which may result in criticism of Indonesia.
"But we argue that a sensible desire to establish normal relationships should be balanced, given the need to discover the truth of what happened, to achieve justice for those who suffered under the occupation and particularly during the last 18 months."
Mr Cowdery said the practical effect of the Government policy was that people working for the ICJ project had to get word into evacuees living within the safe havens at East Hills in Sydney, Puckapunyal in Victoria and Leeuwin base in Western Australia that ICJ representatives would like to speak to them.
There were "some hundreds" of evacuees who could be spoken to, and about 700 volunteers in the ICJ task force, many of them lawyers, prepared to take statements and put them in a form that would be acceptable before any international criminal tribunal that might be set up.
"We want to take that evidence now while the details are still fresh and before it becomes contaminated in the legal sense by people sharing recollections and so forth," Mr Cowdery said.
"But what we have to do now is invite them to get in touch with us. This makes it very inefficient. It makes it very slow and the concern is that time will escape and that people who are in a position and do want to talk will go back to East Timor before there is an opportunity to speak to them."
A five-member international panel had been established by the United Nations to look at information on East Timor and the Australian section of the ICJ had until early next month to report to them.
The panel in turn had to report by December 31, so there was very little time. The task force had already given background material and intelligence to the panel, but there was a lot more it could get.
Mr Cowdery said the task force did not have formal UN accreditation, though the UN Human Rights Commission and its head, Ms Mary Robinson, were aware of what was being done and approved of it.