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Militia leader warns of attack if he is arrested

Source
Agence France Presse - October 3, 2000

Jakarta – Former leader of East Timor's Aitarak militia Eurico Guterres warned here Monday that his supporters in West Timor could try to take over an East Timor district if he was arrested.

"If I am arrested or put in jail, there is no guarantee that they would not launch an attack. To take one district in East Timor is easy, because there are 130,000 of us," Guterres told a press conference, referring to the number of East Timorese refugees reported to be in West Timor.

The former deputy commander of the officially disbanded pro-Indonesian East Timorese militias was responding to comments by Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid in Latin America on Friday that he be put in jail. "People like Eurico Guterres if necessary ... should be arrested," Wahid was quoted as saying by the state Antara newsagency on a flight from Venezuela to Brazil.

Muhammad Rachman, who heads official team probing human rights violations in East Timor, had told journalists on Friday that Guterres was named a suspect in cases of human rights abuses in East Timor. Two other militia leaders and one Indonesian officer were also named at the same time.

The militias went into a frenzy of murder, terror and destruction in East Timor following the overwhelmingly pro-independence ballot there on August 30 last year.

Guterres, who had headed the feared Dili-based Aitarak militia group, said his supporters would not accept his arrest. Claiming that he was being victimised and made into a scapegoat, Guterres said Wahid had ordered his arrest because of international pressure.

"Wahid's desire to arrest me is based on orders from the outside world ... the president and Foreign Minister Alwi Shihab said that arresting Eurico would show to the world that Indonesia is serious – even though I myself have never done anything wrong," he said. "I feel innocent."

Guterres said he had flown to Jakarta to make it easier for authorities to arrest him. "It's better that they arrest me in Jakarta, rather than in my neighbourhood," he said. "I've been here for two days now, but no one has come to arrest me. Hopefully after seeing me on television they will realise I am here and hopefully summons me," he said.

A spokesman for the attorney general's office, Yushar Yahya, had told AFP that prosecutors were preparing a renewed summons for Guterres to appear for questioning in "the next few days."

Guterres was originally summonsed to appear on September 14 but failed to show up, claiming he had never received the summons. He appeared on the island of Bali instead, at a meeting with Indonesia's chief political and security affairs minister, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. "The summons was delayed the first time because Guterres had to attend a meeting in Bali," Yahya said.

Guterres said he was ready to answer "any summons for any case" as soon as he received it. "If they want me to come now, that's fine, if they want me to come tomorrow that's fine too." "I've done nothing wrong," he said.

Guterres' home in the West Timor capital Kupang was searched at the weekend by police looking for weapons, as part of the second phase of efforts to disarm militias in the province. Guterres told reporters in Jakarta he had no weapons left. "I've handed over 132 weapons. There are no leftovers," he said.

Indonesia's treatment of Guterres came under scathing criticism from the UN's chief administrator in East Timor, Sergio Viera de Mello, when he addressed the Security Council in New York on Friday. Calling Guterres a "thug" and a "well-known suspect of crimes against humanity", De Mello said he "should be behind bars instead of being invited to attend meetings with high-level Indonesian officials."

De Mello said he doubted the ability of the Indonesian army to disband militias in West Timor. "Where resolution and a certain degree of ruthlessness would seem to be required, we are witnessing hesitation and prevarication," he told the UN Security Council in a public meeting.

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