Vaudine England – The chief of staff for the United Nations mission in East Timor has resigned, citing management failures and racism as reasons for his departure.
When Nagalingam Parameswaran leaves the capital, Dili, this week there will be no senior manager at the UN Transitional Administration in East Timor (Untaet) from a Southeast Asian country.
In his resignation letter, Mr Parameswaran said Untaet "has become very much a 'white' mission, an Eastern mission with a Western face".
But UN sources said that while he may have a point about his origins working against him, the underlying reasons for his departure were more to do with debate over fundamental UN policy and office politics.
Mr Parameswaran, a Malaysian diplomat, has worked hard during his time in Dili on a key plank of UN policy – the bringing back to East Timor of the tens of thousands of refugees held by militia bosses in neighbouring Indonesian West Timor.
He has been the only senior figure capable of speaking to the Indonesians in their language and has managed ties with militia leaders such as Nemecio de Carvallho, who has been brought back successfully to East Timor.
But opponents within the UN, especially its Serious Crimes Unit, have accused Mr Parameswaran of "making too many deals" with the Indonesians, or of concentrating too much on the reconciliation aspect of the returns policy and not enough on justice against the militia bosses.
"He was disliked for his work with the militias from the beginning, and then his approaches began to bear fruit and other people started to encroach on his area," a UN source said.
In his resignation letter, Mr Parameswaran names the deputy to the Untaet chief, Sergio Vieira de Mello, as "often excluding" him from key decisions.
The respected New Zealander Dennis McNamara was brought in as Untaet deputy last year, partly to improve the Serious Crimes Unit's performance.
Debate on the justice versus reconciliation issue infects the whole question of East Timor's survival as an independent nation surrounded by Indonesia, the former invading power. Mr Parameswaran's claims of racism are more controversial.
"If you go by the number count of white versus brown in the senior levels of Untaet, then Param is quite right," a senior Western diplomat at Untaet said.
"Param's point is that with his departure there will be no senior Asean figure at Untaet and he's right. My question is whether that was intentional and I don't think it was.
"I will say though that it is a shame that the UN didn't make more effort to hire people who can speak Indonesian and Tetum [the East Timorese language].
"Untaet was anti-Indonesian from the beginning and only realised the importance of close ties to Jakarta too late."