The UN Security Council is set to renew the mandate of the UN Mission of Support in East Timor (UNMISET) for a further six months, the United Nations said yesterday.
The resolution, to be adopted by the council in open session, states that the six-month extension of UNMISET's mandate be followed by a subsequent mandate extension "for a further and final period of six months, until May 20 2005."
UNMISET, whose mandate expires in a week, was set up under Security Council resolution 1480 on May 19 2003, when the former Portuguese colony, occupied for 30 years by Indonesia, gained independence under UN auspices.
In a Security Council report released earlier this month, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan recommended the UNMISET mandate be extended for a year.
An extension of the UN mandate would be expected to "accomplish essential tasks" and "reinforce those accomplished," Annan said, adding that this would help propel East Timor toward autonomy.
The resolution follows Annan's recommendations on UNMISET personnel to be set at 58 civilian advisors, 157 police advisors, 42 military liaison officers, 310 trained troops and a 125-person International Response Unit.
It also sets a final deadline of May 20, 2005 for the activities of the unit charged with investigating atrocities committed a day after the independence referendum in 1999 by pro-Indonesian militias organized by Jakarta's army.
On Monday, a UN-backed tribunal in East Timor issued an arrest warrant for Indonesian presidential candidate Wiranto for crimes against humanity in the territory in 1999, denied by Wiranto.
Indonesia rejected the warrant and the Dili government said it would work with the ex-general if he wins the July 5 election, for which he is the candidate of Indonesia's largest party, Golkar.
Wiranto was Jakarta's military chief when army-backed militiamen waged a murderous campaign against independence supporters in East Timor, then an Indonesian territory.
Some 1,400 people were murdered before and after East Timorese voted in the August 1999 referendum.
The Security Council, in the latest resolution, "reaffirms the need to fight against impunity and the importance for the international community to lend its support in this regard."