Jakarta – Just hours after the UN Security Council called on Jakarta to crack down on anti-independence gangs conducting raids in East Timor, an Indonesian court Wednesday threw out criminal charges against a prominent militia leader.

The official Antara news agency said the district court in Kupang, in Indonesian West Timor, freed Eurico Guterres after dismissing charges that he had illegally carried weapons.

Presiding Judge Adelbert Tobing said the charges filed by Indonesian police against Guterres had been "vague." He said it wasn't clear whether Guterres, who is among hundreds of other militiamen sheltering in West Timor, was a civilian or a part of Indonesian military.

Guterres, head of the pro-Indonesian Aitarak militia, was arrested in Kupang in April. Possession of automatic weapons is a felony in Indonesia and can carry a maximum penalty of seven years in prison.

The militia groups have been accused of murdering hundreds of people in East Timor before and after a UN-supervised ballot on August 30 in which the territory's people voted for independence from Indonesian rule. Guterres' Aitarak militia was based in Dili, East Timor's capital, and is blamed for much of the bloody mayhem.