September 13, 1999

Subject: The Humanitarian Crisis in East Timor is far from over: Many feedbacks

Hello everyone

After the pressure from the world public opinion and calls for action to stop the carnage in East Timor reached fever pitch, the hidden powers controlling the world political situation behind the scene, told *their* men in Indonesia that they had better relent and say they accept an international force on the ground in East Timor because *their* heads of states, gathered in New Zealand, needed such a good news to put a positive spin on their - so far - callous disregard for the human tragegy still unfolding in East Timor... And they wanted to douse the world public opinion with a calming dose of pre-packaged "good news" to turn everyone's attention towards something else. But sorry guys! We don't buy into this "great" solution. The Australian military who could be in East Timor real quick are not allowed to go and the Western cavalry won't come trumpeting onto the shores of East Timor in time to save anyone from the pogrom still going unabated - see unreported news below from the hills in East Timor.

And the Indonesian killers are now going to play the delaying game in the corridors of the dismally inefficient Unites Nations in New York, whose referendum in East Timor has ignited the whole tragedy in the first place. The outcome of this referendum was easily foreseeable as well as the brutal reaction of the Indonesian regime who is prepared to go to whatever extreme it takes to keep its hold on every single piece of real estate of the country - just like so many other such national "empires" on Earth - Think of Russia holding on to Daguestan... Think of China ever escalating its military preparations to deter Taiwan from declaring its definite independence from China - perhaps the next flashpoint - and continuing its brutal occupation Tibet... And so on...

And then there is the question of who will control the huge untapped oil reserves under East Timor if the information provided below is correct. You can bet that after going through such hell and being burned to the ground, East Timor is years away from being able to become a workable independent country, thus allowing the hidden powers -- the financial elite - of this world ample time to secure a firm grip on those assets - another open-ended UN protectorate as in Kosovo perhaps?...

Sorry for sounding so pessimistic but, despite the apparent good news, I say beware of the cunning manipulations of the world public opinion through the mass media. There is much more than what meets the eye in the latest developments reported in the news in the last 24 hours...

Still, it is reassuring to see that the focussed attention and combined actions or *extra*ordinary people around the world has been able to force the Powers That Be to take notice of our visceral opposition to what is going on in East Timor and take some -- cosmetic? we will see! -- actions.

Let us all keep the heat on!

Jean Hudon Earth Rainbow Network Coordinator http://www.cybernaute.com/earthconcert2000

AND THANKS A LOT FOR THE MOST EXCELLENT CONTRIBUTIONS SENT BY PEOPLE ON THIS LIST -- SEE BELOW -- THE OVERALL PICTURE THUS DEPICTED WITH EVERYONE'S INPUT IS A TRULY AWESOME COLLECTIVE RAINBOW ACHIEVEMENT!

Date: Mon, 13 Sep 1999 From: grace <grace@senet.com.au> Subject: Latest news on East Timor

Hi

Relief, hopefully, is on its way to East Timor, but the people there are still in dire need. It is not over yet - now there are concerns about HOW the peace keeping will be implemented - and all this admist conditions in which the people are starving.

JUST RECEIVED! - SEE MORE AT THE END TOO

Date: Mon, 13 Sep 1999 From: grace <grace@senet.com.au> Subject: people starving

Hi Tonnes of rice sit at the Darwin Harbour, while East Timorese sheltering in Hills outside Dili, starve. The Australian air force will not deliver much needed food and medical supplies until they are given the go-ahead by the Indonesian government. This has not yet happened .... many may die before then. These people need our prayers and meditations. Now that a decision has been made to let in foreign aid, it would be terrible to see help come too late for many of them.

Please join me in meditations daily at 10 am and 10 pm (+9:30 GMT) to restore balance in East Timor. The crisis in East Timor is still far from over.

With love Grace

The latest reports from East Timor:

Starving eat leaves on trek out of hell

By LOUISE WILLIAMS

It was the last hope of a desperate people.

When the Catholic churches were ransacked and burnt, and those who believed in their sanctity gunned down inside, the people fled to the arid hills, where now they are reduced to scavenging for leaves in a new battle against starvation.

As Indonesian troops were reported to be advancing on about 50,000 refugees trapped on a ridge behind the provincial capital, Dili, thousands were trying yesterday to walk to positions held by the rag-tag pro-independence army, Falintil, itself ill-equipped to save them.

"The adults are eating leaves, but we have nothing for the children and we have no food to bring them," said a Falintil spokesman, contacted by satellite phone in the remote mountains.

"This is a very, very big problem and people will die of hunger because they had to run and had no time to bring supplies with them."

Falintil is a guerilla army of small mobile units without the capacity to shelter thousands of civilians.

The spokesman said about 5,000 people, many of them elderly, had arrived at another cantonment further north where guerillas were trying to divide the remaining rations of rice and hunt deer and wild boar.

Among those believed to be sheltering in remote forests are the Bishop of Baucau, The Most Rev Basilio do Nascimento, who is injured, and scores of priests and nuns.

"The churches and the United Nations compound were the only places for the people to shelter and with those gone the only place to go now is up into mountains, but we have no stockpiles of food or medicine," the spokesman said of last week's slaughter of priests, nuns and civilians.

"The refugees are really in a critical condition, particularly the young children because we have no milk, and the old," he said of the tens of thousands who have fled to Dare, the site of a Catholic seminary overlooking Dili.

The UN spokesman in Darwin, Mr David Wimhurst, said he had reports from relatives of East Timorese in Australia and a Catholic nun in Melbourne claiming that Indonesian soldiers were hunting down and killing refugees in Dare.

Although several deaths were confirmed overnight, a massacre could not be independently verified. But the independence spokesman Mr Jose Ramos Horta said five women in Dare had commited suicide to avoid being raped or killed by Indonesian troops.

An Australian Red Cross spokesman, Mr Vedran Drakulic, said international agencies must be allowed access to East Timor to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe.

"The experience of the Red Cross so far is that those who fled across the border into West Timor came with almost nothing; obviously those who fled into the hills were probably in the same situation."

More than 100,000 East Timorese have been forced across the border into West Timor, where murders of independence supporters have been reported in camps controlled by Jakarta-backed militia units and along the roads out of East Timor.

Mr Drakulic said it was impossible to accurately estimate how many people were facing starvation in the hills.

"For the people in the hills it will not be a bright future. Already before the crisis the people had been affected by inadequate food supplies. They are not fit and in the case of severe food shortages and without access to water they will be affected very quickly. It is critical to access these people."

One expert said the area around Dare had some natural water supplies, but insufficient for the 30,000 to 50,000 in the region.

He also said that although there were some fruit and vegetable farms in the area it was the beginning of the dry season so little could be scavenged.

Conditions on foreign force could limit Australia's role

COMMENT by HAMISH MACDONALD

Diplomats will be waiting to see what difficulties Indonesian negotiators will put in the way of a speedy insertion of peace-keepers into East Timor. A prime worry for Australia is that Jakarta may seek to limit or even exclude Australian troops in the force.

President Habibie's foreign policy adviser, Dr Dewi Fortuna Anwar, was last night extremely cautious about this subject, refusing to say whether or not Australians would be welcome. It was for the UN Secretary-General, Mr Kofi Annan, to decide. "If he is a wise man he will decide which countries won't further complicate the situation," she said. "I think we prefer to see Asian faces in such peacekeeping troops. I think they would be more palatable to Indonesian people." The characterisation of the operation as "security co-operation" by Dr Habibie also raises the question of who will be in charge.

It would be unacceptable for the UN force to come under Indonesian command, and it is hard to see Indonesia's TNI placing itself under a foreign general on what it still considers its national territory.

For all that, Dr Habibie has staked his faltering presidency on implementing the results of the August 30 referendum and claiming credit as a supporter of human rights.

He gave a bold speech in the gilded splendour of Jakarta's Freedom Palace flanked by his army generals, who must have been grinding their teeth behind impassive faces.

From today he can expect the recriminations for allowing foreign troops on Indonesian soil for the first time since the Dutch left in 1949.

Members of the United Nations Security Council Mission said the President's announcement was "very positive" but warned that hard negotiation would now start in New York with the Foreign Minister, Mr Ali Alatas.

Mr Alatas is a diplomat steeped in the intricacies of UN procedures and if there is any move to spin out the offer by raising practical obstacles, he is the man to do it.


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From: "ekogaia" <ekogaia@iafrica.com> Subject: East Timor and the world Date: Sat, 11 Sep 1999

Hi Jean,

Thanks for all the posts and news, both good and bad.

As far as East Timor goes the complete lack of international action there is nothing new. Angola, Burundi and Rwanda, Burma, Sudan, Congo, Tibet, Afghanistan, Kurdistan, Eritrea; the list goes on.

Speaking from an African perspective it is obvious that the industrialised North will not move on a problem unless it either threatens their status quo, offers possibilities to test their arms, or impacts on their economic base.

It is patently obvious that the world is no longer run by Sovereign nations but that National and Regional governments that are dictated to by Corporate interests. The governance of the world is dictated by entities that have no conscience or morality and that only views humanity as another resource to be plundered.

The sale of war materiel to Indonesia by Britain and others shows this callous cynicism of profits weighed against people.

It is imperative that we perceive the big picture and realise that, yes the world is run by arms merchants and those who seek to control the worlds food by patent rights. Those that wield the economic power are those who must be brought in line by regulation of their activities.

Americans must not vote for the same good ol boys next time around, we need new methods. Fire the politicians. Retrieve power by putting in those that can make the difference. We need to outlaw greed with no conscience.

Globalisation is rapidly becoming renegade. Soros noticed this in his assessment of the movement of predatory capital in the global marketplace. The new world order is assuming proportions of a giant, stumbling along whilst attempting to remain upright all the time crushing nations and people beneath its feet as it blunders forward unconstrained by the laws of humanity, decency, morality or liability.

It is up to us all to not buy in to the system. Avoid enriching corporate power whenever possible, even if you have to pay a premium. Remember, that premium is the real cost; corporates never take the environmental cost of goods, or the social cost of services. Dont cut corners and support morality and not greed.

Bhopal, the Rape of the Oceans, pollution of our support system, deforestation, consumerism are all only symptoms of the sickness of the human condition. Power is not at the centre, it comes from the fringe of Greed, Profits, Neo-colonialism, power, subjugation all run amok, just as the militias in East Timor have done.

The symptom is of the world gone mad. To cure it we have to expose the world to the reality of the situation. The millennium will come and go but the system will stagger on.

The mainstream media will never spread the word. The internet is our salvation by inter-linking humanity to spread the new way.

We have got the people (like you Jean who does so much to spread the word), we have got the ideas, we have got methods, we have love on our side and we cannot lose. But in order to change things we must continue to show what the problem is and to change it by demonstrating the "new way".

Meditation is a great tool but we must never forget that even the greatest thoughts are nothing if not acted upon or shared.

Spread the word, shout it from the rooftops, speak to your neighbour, remember to love and things will come right. We will make it so. All of us. Together.

Love

Glenn

NOTE FROM JEAN: RIGHT ON!!!


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From: "HempMatters" <itdoes@hempmatters.com> Subject: RE: more on Timor Date: Sat, 11 Sep 1999

A Massive chunk that has been left out of the whole debate on E Timor is the regions resources. Unknown to many is the fact that Timor lies on top of one of the world's last massive untapped oil reserves. The Timor shelf runs between the islands and Australia. It holds oil more than the Middle East ever did and they haven't even started drilling yet! An independant and wealthy Timor is not something that many people down there would like and it would drastically change the power and economic differences between North and South Indonesia.

Now wouldn't that be a shake up !!

Concerned Hempster


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From: SHIVADAS88@aol.com Date: Sat, 11 Sep 1999 Subject: Re: Feedbacks to the Humanitarian Crisis in East Timor

Dear Jean:

I can't read anymore. It is so sad that things like this happen. I have children as well, my youngest daughter being 13 years old, and I can never imagine this type of horror happening to her. I would not be able to bear it. My Heart tells me that little girl you are talking about is my daughter, that in God's eyes we are all one, and when I read Jimmy Twyman's letters from the Secret Order of the Beloved Disciple, they talk about feeding the sheep of God. I feel responsible because I can do something. I want to "pray peace" East Timor and let the violet flame of God's eternal Love bless these blessed people free. Free from fear. Free to be Godlike. Free to laugh and Free to Love and be Love!

Thank you for inspiring me to pray. I appreciate your devotion to Peace and honor

YOUR SWEET HEART! MY HEART CRIES WITH YOU!

PEACE WILL PREVAIL ON EARTH! AMEN!

MICHAEL


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Date: Sat, 11 Sep 1999 08 From: Michael Wise <wisesongs@earthlink.net> Subject: Re: Feedbacks to the Humanitarian Crisis in East Timor

Hello Jean,

Your words and intentions of Unconditional Love
Light are the highest and greatest gifts you can give to this beautiful world. You are truly a Light among us.

We all thank you for your dedication and sincerity!! We all Love you very much!

In Deepest Divine Love

Michael Wise

p.s. Sweet Dreams Dearest Jade!!! You have chosen your parents well!!!


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From: "Sabine McNeill" <sabine@globalnet.co.uk> Subject: Humanity Unite! Date: Sat, 11 Sep 1999

Dear Carol, dear Jean,

I loved your remark and your response and I wanted to add to your dialogue.

For in 1981 (! well before the Net!) I had the vision of people and computers protecting our planet and created the idea / network / organisation called PEACE NETWORK. Then I discovered that there were 'outer' and 'inner' peace people and that the twain don't necessarily mix.

As a 'passionate and compulsory networker' I found out about LETS software and set up the first Local Exchange Trading System in London. Then I discovered that people thought it was a great idea but they don't trade. They just want to socialise. Then I found out about commercial barter and the depth of the National Debt problem and the abdication of power by governments to banks.

Now I am organising meetings at the House of Lords to raise awareness on that level and promote commercial barter as well as local LETS. And what am I experiencing? Problems with men who cannot acknowledge a woman who knows what she wants and acts on it...

Meanwhile I follow my bliss and work on preparing a revolution in science.

In other words, the best tool for humanity to unite would be interest-free money. For money is for the collective what blood is for the individual: the flow-tool of exchange and nourishment. But debt-based money cannot have that functionality.

Thanks for letting me express my thoughts this way. Need to work on a website next...

Sabine


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Date: Sat, 11 Sep 1999 From: Enny Soekoer <enns@indosat.net.id> Subject: "Add me to your list".

(clip)

Well Jean, those situation make me scare to watch news on TV, I live in this country, Indonesia. As you Know, those are happened not only in East Timor, but also in Aceh and Ambon, perhaps it will be followed by Irian and I don't know others.

Yes, we have to differ between the power and the people. People of Indonesia, at least, me and friends of mine.... are talking about those violence. Still, in this reformation era, we don't have a brave to react strongly to the power because, seems the military and police officer are not in our side yet.

I pray to God to let the parliament convened take place earlier, so, the Indonesia's military will have no right to operate its forces in Timtim anymore. They did get their freedom, didn't they.

OK Jean, this is a little things about me and my feeling of what have been happened in my country. Hope I will get all news of what happen in the world from you.

God may bless us, e. soekoer


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Date: Sun, 12 Sep 1999 From: Antares <antares@tm.net.my> Subject: [Fwd: Antares on East Timor /...a 1000 years of hatred]

VERY SAD, WHAT HAS BEEN ALLOWED TO HAPPEN IN DILI, EAST TIMOR... FOR WHAT IT'S WORTH, HERE'S MY COMMENTARY ON THE ISSUE:

Susan Ferguson wrote:

Antares---feel free to tell us what is really going on here. Is this religious, economic, or just the normal human psychosis? It's obvious that the multinationals and their armies have no interest in protecting these people. Why was an election allowed in the first place? The army general in Jakarta is in control of Indonesia? ---Susan

AND ANTARES, WHO LIVES IN MALAYSIA, RESPONDED:

Eruptions of bloodlust and carnage that periodically destroy the comfortable illusion that we are a "civilized" race can be traced to restimulated birth canal traumas (those interested, please check out Stanislav Grof's seminal work on Basic Perinatal Matrices).

In the case of East Timor, we have a very complex case of hereditary hatred distilled from more than a thousand years of cultural, racial and ideological conflict stemming from the Crusades. The ancient and unresolved hatred is deliberately kept on the simmer by ruling cliques who believe they can maintain control of human destiny by manipulating fear and greed and primate territorial conditioning amongst their subjects.

The Arab-Muslim world has never conceded defeat by their Jewish-Christian siblings. Instead they moved eastwards and Islamicized parts of India, Indonesia, the Malay Archipelago, and the Philippines. Earlier Hindu influence in these areas had established rigid caste hierarchies from which Islam offered an easy way out - but the ancient feudal mentality has persisted, and independent thinking and individuality are not encouraged by the parochial governments of these territories.

Frustration building up among the masses is usually redirected and ventilated on convenient scapegoats - usually anything "foreign" or "Jewish" or "Christian." In the traditional pecking order of skin pigmentation, the fairer ones tend to despise the darker ones (although recent radical perceptual shifts have resulted in the "black is beautiful" ethos) - and thus it's very easy for Indonesian Muslims to regard the Black-Portuguese Catholic natives of East Timor as "sub-humans" - just as the Malay Muslims are threatened by the indisputable indigenousness of the animistic Orang Asli, whom they view as an inferior breed.

When times are good, these latent prejudices are papered over with the political concept of national unity - but when the economic boat is violently rocking, these atavistic blood feuds resurface.

The Indonesian military has always been the backbone of political power in Indonesia. General Suharto rose to prominence by deposing the popular Sukarno in 1965 and one of his sons continues to exert massive influence on ABRI (the political wing of the Indonesian Armed Forces). Their argument for forceful suppression of ethnic revolts in East Timor and Acheh is based on a deep-rooted fear that separatist movements will bring about the swift collapse of the Indonesian Republic - just as in 1991 the USSR rapidly broke up into a very loose commonwealth of independent states, as soon as central control was relaxed.

The US and Australian governments have long supported the corrupt Suharto regime (despite its wretched human rights track record) because they valued their capital investments in labour-rich Indonesia. But when Suharto and his family got too greedy and were unable to adapt to the new political realities, they installed Habibie as a caretaker president while the IMF moved in to take charge of the financial housekeeping.

But let's face it: in a political milieu founded on economic rather than ethical values, the UN (or NATO) will only step in militarily where capital investments are threatened or where there are massive monetary gains at stake. Helping sort out the mess in East Timor or Acheh holds very little economic returns for the US - and, in the long term, the restoration of civil and human rights in Indonesia will put paid to western capitalist control of these ex-colonies of the Great Pirates. Hence the moral paralysis.

What can we do as planetary citizens? For a start we can overthrow the rule of (Economic) Might Is Right within our own countries which has corrupted all levels of governance, so that Big Government and Big Business can no longer be separated. We can insist that the Age of Cynicism, Hypocrisy, and Economic Opportunism be ended right here and now!

The process won't take centuries or even generations. Paradigm shifts can occur in a matter of nanoseconds.

Antares




LAST MINUTE ADDITION:

By MICHELLE GRATTAN, BERNARD LAGAN, HAMISH McDONALD and MARK DODD

The East Timor peacekeeping mission has bogged down within a day of Indonesia's approval - forcing rescue nations to use dramatic new tactics to try to save thousands of refugees facing renewed attacks and starvation.

The Minister for Defence, Mr Moore, said Australian troops could be deployed by the weekend.

But United Nations aid officials are pressing Jakarta for approval for immediate food and medical air drops to more than 100,000 refugees who are facing death while diplomats sort out the composition and timing of the peace force.

In Darwin last night, the UN took over a waterfront warehouse and was trucking in tonnes of rice, tuna, medical supplies and water in the hope of arranging air drops to both East Timor and West Timor, where thousands of refugees have been forcibly taken.

But by last night there had been no go-ahead for the drops and two UN Hercules flew into Darwin after aborting an unannounced mercy mission to rescue more than 1,000 people in the beleaguered UN compound in Dili. There will be further attempts to fly the refugees to Darwin.

New reports of atrocities emerged yesterday, including accounts of refugees being shipped out to sea under the direction of soldiers wearing UN helmets and jackets.

The refugees were enticed on board by being told they were going to Java or Australia, but the empty vessels returned to port after only a short time, according to the reports.

The Darwin-based East Timorese International Support Centre has received witness accounts from Dili of piles of bodies burnt in the streets just before a UN delegation arrived on Saturday to assess the situation.

The Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Downer, flew to New York yesterday for talks with Mr Annan and Indonesia's Foreign Minister, Mr Ali Alitas.

The earliest that talks on the peacekeeping force could begin is tonight, Sydney time. However, Indonesian reservations about Australians leading the 7,000-strong force risk drawing out the negotiations.

Indonesia's President Habibe announced clearance for the force on Sunday night, but almost immediately Australia's role became an issue.

By yesterday, the Prime Minister, with strong backing from the UN Secretary-General, Mr Kofi Annan, and President Clinton, was insisting that Australia would do the job it was asked to do.

Mr Howard rejected suggestions from some in Indonesia that the force should be led by an Asian nation.

"We have been asked to lead it and as far as I am concerned that is entirely appropriate," he said. No representative of the Indonesian Government had suggested to him that Australia should not lead it.

As planning intensified for the force, which will initially include 2,000 Australians, Mr Howard signalled that Australian defence and aid spending was likely to rise as part of a response to the changing region.

"There is nothing in the Australian-US alliance which says that every time we are involved together, the Americans have to provide the lion share and take the lead, particularly when it's something right on our doorstep".

"I think it is quite possible that this country will have to spend more money on defence in the years ahead."

Troops waiting and at the ready

By PETER COLE-ADAMS, Defence Correspondent

As the humanitarian tragedy in East Timor deepens, the shape of a multilateral peacekeeping force is in limbo.

Everything depends, first, on talks in New York tonight, Sydney time, between the United Nations Secretary-General, Mr Kofi Annan, and the Indonesian Foreign Minister, Mr Ali Alatas, and, second, on decisions then to be made by the UN Security Council.

The Defence Minister, Mr Moore, indicated that although key Australian units were ready to go within 24 hours, it would probably be the end of the week at the earliest before advance elements of the force could be sent into East Timor.

He ruled out an immediate drop of food and emergency supplies to thousands of refugees who have fled from Dili into the mountains.

"If you start flying over East Timor at the sort of altitudes you need to drop effectively over hill country, you'd certainly be putting yourself into considerable danger," he said, adding that there were thousands of Indonesian troops in the province.

About a dozen countries have agreed in principle to join Australia in contributing to a multi-nation force, but many are holding off on detailed pledges until the Security Council authorises a peacekeeping mission and spells out its mandate and rules of engagement.

The concern is that the Indonesians will try to negotiate limited numbers (particularly of Australians and other non-Asians) and a tightly restricted and lightly armed role for the multinational force in the period between now and ratification of the independence vote next month or in early November by the Indonesian People's Consultative Assembly.

Jakarta may also try to resist calls from Australia, the United States and Mr Annan for Australia to provide the commander of the force, at least during this interim period when the multi-national force may have to operate alongside the Indonesian military.

Informed sources say the commander of the Australian contingent is likely to be Brigadier David Hurley, the commander of the Darwin-based Ist Brigade, but it is not certain that he, or any Australian, will be the overall commander in this interim phase.

Among those named as likely to take over as commander of the multi-nation force after East Timor becomes independent under UN control later this year is Brigadier Mike Smith, a former commander of the ready deployment brigade in Townsville and now directing East Timor policy in the International Policy Division at the Defence Department.

Australia has pledged to provide up to 4,500 troops to the international force, including air and naval elements. Britain is ready to send 250 Brunei-based Gurkha soldiers and the guided-missile destroyer HMS Glasgow, which carries a detachment of marines. New Zealand has already sent a Hercules transport to Darwin and has at least 350 troops on stand-by.

The US has yet to spell out its role, but has indicated that it will provide crucial transport, logistics and communications.

Countries that have given in-principle commitments are Canada, France, Portugal, Sweden and four members of the Association of South-East Asian Nations: Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Singapore. Cambodia and Brazil have also expressed interest in participating. Japan is ready to make a financial contribution.

Bodies burn, refugees starve amid fears of 'final solution'

By BERNARD LAGAN in Darwin

Piles of bodies were burnt on the streets of Dili at the weekend and tens of thousands of refugees were without food or water as they fled the militias and the Indonesian Army.

Reports out of Dili described fresh atrocities, including renewed targeting of nuns and priests, the shooting ofpeople on the waterfront and boats packed with refugeesleaving the port only to return empty shortly after.

Dr Andrew McNaughton, spokesman for the Darwin-based East Timorese International Support Centre, feared the militias and the Indonesian Army had embarked on "a final solution" in East Timor that had echoes of Nazi Germany.

He also doubted that the UN peacekeeping force would arrive in time to save thousands from dying of thirst and starvation.

Some have already died and many more are expected to succumb within days if urgent attempts by the UN to arrange air drops of water and food out of Darwin fail.

UN and East Timorese groups stressed that immediate air drops were critical if thousands were to be saved in both East Timor and West Timor, where many have been forcibly sent.

But by last night there had been no go-ahead from the Indonesian authorities.

The East Timorese International Support Centre said it received witness accounts yesterday of piles of bodies burnt on Dili streets just before a UN Security Council delegation arrived on Saturday.

Dr McNaughton said an estimated 300,000 East Timorese were now hiding in the mountains and seeking protection from the pro-independence Falantil groups. But they were running out of food and water.

"People are dying, particularly the old and the young," he said. "This is exactly what is happening now."

Dr McNaughton said that in Dare, about 20 kilometres from Dili, about 30,000 refugees were sheltering in a monastery and two people had reportedly died overnight from fever.

The UN's spokesman in Darwin, Mr David Wimhurst, said: "There are hundreds of thousands of refugees clustered in the mountains without adequate food, or no food. They are living on roots or what they can scavenge."

He confirmed that priests, nuns and other church workers were still being attacked.

The latest to die was the Acting Moderator of the East Timor Protestant Church, the Rev Francisco da Vasconcelos Ximenes who was pulled from a truck and executed at the roadside.




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