Vaudine England – Tension had been escalating in the refugee camps of Indonesian West Timor for several weeks before yesterday's attack on the UN office in Atambua, in which three staff, all foreigners, were burned to death.
Pro-Jakarta militia who ravaged East Timor last year after its vote for independence – and abused many of the 90,000 East Timorese refugees they control – have attacked international aid staff at will.
It has also been clear that the Indonesian Government is unable to control the militiamen and their patrons in the security forces. Foreign Minister Alwi Shihab promised several weeks ago to close the camps but has since produced no details of when or how that will be accomplished, other than to say overseas aid organisations would need to help.
Increasingly frustrated, UN officials have sought safety guarantees for their staff in Kupang, the West Timorese capital, in accordance with treaties signed with Indonesia, but Jakarta remains helpless. This combination of inertia, lack of political will and militia-led lawlessness made the vicious deaths of the UN staff who died yesterday a tragedy waiting to happen.
"We have been in meetings all this week with Untas [the pro-Indonesian group Uni Timor Aswain], trying to facilitate a dialogue with them for a meeting between all East Timorese groups in early October. The talks were difficult, but we thought we were making some progress. And then this happens – it's awful," said a UN staffer waiting last night in Kupang for evacuation to safety.
In a series of incidents, pro-Indonesian militia gangs, using East Timorese refugees as shields, have attacked, threatened, beaten and intimidated staff of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Several times, it and other aid agencies have suspended operations to repatriate the remaining refugees to East Timor while they sought assurances from Jakarta.
Only last week, UNHCR work in the camps resumed after a six-day shutdown caused by attacks by militia thugs. A violent rampage occurred last week in which militiamen attacked a local legislature building and beat up several journalists. At the same time, a hunger strike was mounted by Untas, fronted by 13 "grassroots" people – that is, refugees goaded on by Untas.
The violence is aimed at forcing international groups out of West Timor so that Untas can manipulate refugees at will. The larger goal appears to be to partition of an independent East Timor, and to force the United Nations out of its role as administrators there, reducing the battle for East Timor to "domestic" status once more. "I think they want all the internationals out," said the UN source in Kupang. "The mob is now getting out of control and they could trash Kupang."
Just before the beating and burning to death of the three UNHCR staff in Atambua, another angry demonstration got under way in the capital, Kupang, yesterday. Kupang youths and militia infiltrators chanted "Untaet Out! Untaet Out!" Untaet is the UN Transitional Administration in East Timor.
A threatened mass protest against Untaet in Kupang was called off on Monday. The protesters, led by notorious East Timorese militia leader Eurico Guterres, had sent a letter last week promising a massive demonstration unless Untaet closed its office in Kupang. "Eurico was seen in Atambua this morning," another UN staff member said yesterday..
In Jakarta, too, a small group of pro-Indonesia East Timorese protested outside UN headquarters, demanding the world body "acknowledge" it had rigged East Timor's independence vote. This view remains widespread in Indonesia, where a nationalistic backlash against East Timorese and their foreign supporters has grown since the August 1999 vote for independence after 24 years of occupation by Indonesian troops, in which 200,000 East Timorese – nearly one in three – were killed or starved to death.