Catharine Munro, Jakarta – Indonesia's military said it has provided legal assistance to militia leaders accused of human rights abuses in East Timor in 1999 ahead of the start of human rights trials in Jakarta this week.

Officials today confirmed that the Indonesian military (TNI) would attend the tribunal hearing the cases. Concerns were recently raised that the tribunal would be boycotted when the TNI refused to give evidence at a human rights commission investigation into the shooting of university students during the political turmoil of 1998 and 1999 in Jakarta.

The investigation was ignored by the military because Parliament had already concluded that the military could not be accused of human rights violations in those cases, a departmental spokesman said.

But the East Timor trials would be fought out in court, according to the TNI's legal team. "We are very serious," said Colonel Setiawan, who uses only one name. "This not only involves institutional responsibility but also state responsibility."

Only a finding of innocent for its members would be seen as fair, according to the TNI's legal department head Major General Timor Manurung. Manurung accused "enemies" of the military of bribing the civilian militias who ransacked East Timor in protest at the pro-independence vote into providing false evidence.

The militia gang leaders were being persuaded to testify that the TNI had supplied them with weapons, he said. "They even tried to bribe with large amounts of money – more than 10 billion rupiah ($A2,000,000)," Manurung told Tempo newspaper.

A department official later confirmed that the TNI was providing legal support to the leaders of civilian militia groups who were among nearly 20 suspects named by prosecutors. So far, militia leaders have not had formal charges laid against them under the Dutch-based system. But three low-level military commanders have already been charged over a massacre in a half-built cathedral in Suai just after August 30, 1999.

Prosecutors allege that 27 East Timorese were massacred in the grounds of the Ave Maria Catholic cathedral. The case is due to begin on March 19. The three, along with a former district police chief, are accused of failing to control their troops in an attack on the compound of the cathedral.

The first case to be heard on Thursday involves former East Timor governor Abilio Soares and former East Timor police chief Timbul Silaen, who will face accusations of crimes against humanity involving widespread and systematic attacks on civilian people.