Dean Yates and Achmad Sukarsono – Indonesia gave mixed signals on Wednesday about a visit by UN experts who will inquire into carnage that swept East Timor in 1999, with one minister calling the trip "irrelevant," but another promising to cooperate.
UN Secretary General Kofi Annan appointed several legal experts to a team early this year to also look into Jakarta's accounting for the violence surrounding East Timor's 1999 vote to break from 24 years of brutal Indonesian rule.
"From our perspective and from Timor Leste's (East Timor's) perspective, this is irrelevant," Information Minister Sofyan Djalil said in an interview when asked about the arrival of the experts, who start their inquiry on Thursday.
But Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda told reporters that Jakarta would cooperate because the UN experts were expected to recognize the work of a separate truth and friendship commission set up by Indonesia and East Timor in March.
"They will review all the processes in dealing with the human rights cases related to the poll in East Timor. Of course, they will present a recommended solution," Wirajuda said.
The experts would meet him on Thursday, Wirajuda said, adding they would also meet with the attorney general, the justice minister and Supreme Court officials.
Annan's move had already irritated Indonesia, which had initially refused to give the members visas to visit.
A UN official who declined to be identified has said Annan, during a trip to Jakarta last month, raised with President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono the Indonesian government's refusal to allow the team members to travel here.
The rampage in the former Portuguese colony, carried out by gangs supported by elements in the Indonesian army, was triggered by the 1999 referendum. The United Nations estimates around 1,000 people were killed before and after the ballot.
An Indonesian special human rights court set up after the violence tried 18 Indonesian military, police officers and civilians over the bloodshed.
Most were acquitted in legal hearings that have almost drawn to a close. Some Western countries criticized proceedings.
The UN team of experts includes an Indian judge, a Japanese law professor and a Fijian lawyer.
Indonesia and East Timor had hoped their separate joint truth and friendship commission – the plan was announced in December – would head off Annan's initiative.
The truth commission, due to start work in August, will have no power to punish anyone over abuses.
The United States said this month that Indonesia would not enjoy full military ties with Washington until it accounted for the violence in East Timor, saying this included cooperating with the UN team of legal experts.
Washington severed military ties after the sacking of East Timor in 1999, and has only begun to revive such cooperation.
Mainly Catholic East Timor has said it wants to have good ties with its giant Muslim neighbor despite the destruction of most of the tiny territory in 1999.
East Timor became independent in May 2002 after two-and-a-half years of UN administration following the referendum.
(Additional reporting by Muklis Ali)