Edith M. Lederer, United Nations – East Timor's president urged the UN Security Council on Monday to keep a small political office in the country after the UN wraps up its six-year operation in May.

President Xanana Gusmao hopes the office will help with next year's elections and support critically needed police training, as well as justice and finance reforms.

Gusmao called for deployment of 15 to 20 "military liaison personnel" as part of a new Special Political Office to ensure cooperation between East Timorese and Indonesian security elements "to prevent tensions and conflict along the border."

Gusmao addressed the council three days after delivering a report on Indonesia's 24-year occupation of East Timor to Secretary-General Kofi Annan. The report by the independent Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation blames over 100,000 deaths and massive human rights violations including starvation, torture, sexual enslavement and the use of napalm primarily on Indonesian security forces.

Indonesia invaded the former Portuguese colony in 1975 and ruled the tiny half-island territory with an iron fist until 1999, when a UN-organized plebiscite resulted in an overwhelming vote for independence. Withdrawing Indonesian troops and their militia auxiliaries destroyed much of the country's infrastructure and killed at least 1,500 people.

The United Nations sent a UN peacekeeping force and administered the territory until East Timor became independent in 2002. A UN political mission is scheduled to wrap up its operations in May.

The independent commission asked the five permanent members of the Security Council the United States, Russia, China, Britain and France as well as the Indonesian and Portuguese governments and governments that sold weapons to Indonesia and supported Indonesia's policy to pay reparations to the victims. It also suggested that contracts for international judges who served on special panels for serious crimes be renewed and that resources be allocated to investigate and try all crimes committed between 1975 and 1999.

Gusmao rejected both recommendations, saying East Timor and Indonesia "are both nascent democracies struggling to put behind us years of conflict, and our fates are in many ways enjoined."

"I have had to ask myself if it is in our national interest, which must include social harmony, to adopt a process that I am told by some friends will bring justice, and have this process go on for years, and possibly set back our democratic consolidation, that is being undertaken in East Timor and Indonesia respectively. The answer that I came to, after wide consultation with the people, was that it is not," he said.

He said the recommendation to bring to court every crime committed since 1975 could easily lead to "political anarchy and social chaos."

Gusmao said East Timor would follow the "restorative justice model" established by Archbishop Desmond Tutu who headed South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission which granted amnesty for the truth, with the goal of healing deep divisions in society.

He quoted Tutu as saying: "Justice as retribution often ignores the victim and the system is usually impersonal and cold. Restorative justice is hopeful."

The international community pressured Jakarta in 2002 to establish a special tribunal to prosecute Indonesians allegedly responsible for the violence. But the trials have been widely criticized as a sham, with all 17 police and military commanders indicted receiving acquittals.

Indonesia and East Timor set up a joint truth and reconciliation commission in August 2005 and Gusmao said he expects it to conclude its work this year, with the possibility of an extension. He also chided the international community for not supporting this initiative.

"The commitment that we should all undertake is not to allow, under any circumstances, a recurrence of political violence in our beloved homeland," Gusmao said.

He said East Timor's relations with its two closest neighbors Indonesia and Australia "continue on a sound basis."

East Timor and Indonesia have reached agreement on 99 percent of the border and the remaining 1 percent should be resolved "in the next few weeks," Gusmao said.

East Timor and Australia signed an agreement on Jan. 12 that provides for a 50-50 share of oil and gas resources in the Greater Sun Rise area, "one of the richest in the entire Asia-Pacific region, and a 50-year moratorium on our maritime boundary, without prejudice of our sovereign claims," he said.