Dili – East Timor's opposition stayed on the offensive Tuesday after the government survived a no-confidence vote over its decision to free an Indonesian militia leader accused of crimes against humanity.

Members of the opposition Fretilin party and its allies brought the motion before the house, accusing the government of Prime Minister Xanana Gusmao of breaking the law by releasing militia leader Martenus Bere from custody.

After a fiery day-long debate which was broadcast on national television, MPs voted late Monday by a margin of 39 to 25 against the motion, officials said.

Had it succeeded, President Jose Ramos-Horta could have dissolved parliament and called an election, a remote prospect given his support for the government's policy of leniency toward rights abusers of the past.

Fretilin lawmaker Arsenio Bano said MPs were scared to censure the government over the Bere affair, which has drawn criticism from the United Nations and independent rights groups like Amnesty International.

"They refused to censure the... prime minister despite his public admission, repeated several times to parliament yesterday, that he ordered the release of Martenus Bere," Bano said in a statement.

Former prime minister Mari Alkatiri led the charge against the government, saying Bere's release less than a month after his arrest in August was unconstitutional and undermined East Timor's independence.

Bere was arrested after crossing into East Timor on August 8, five years after being indicted for his role in a string of human rights violations including the 1999 Suai church massacre in which up to 200 people were killed.

Gusmao, who led East Timor's resistance against Indonesian rule before its 1999 vote for independence, defended freeing Bere as a "political decision" that was "in the national interest".

Bere has stayed at the Indonesian embassy in the capital Dili since his August 30 release.

Government MPs argued his release was necessary to prevent reprisals against Timorese studying in Indonesia, and said a trial would have done nothing to improve reconciliation between the two countries.

Gusmao and Nobel prize laureate Ramos-Horta insist that building cordial ties with Indonesia is more important than dwelling on its crimes, despite UN calls for an international tribunal.

Indonesia's brutal 24-year occupation of East Timor ended with bloody violence by Indonesian troops and their militia proxies who opposed the 1999 UN-backed independence vote.