Indonesian Government Must Prevent East Timor Bloodbath

(New York, September 3, 1999)—The next forty-eight hours could bring widespread death and destruction in East Timor unless world leaders exerted maximum pressure on the Indonesian government, Human Rights Watch said today.The results of last Monday's referendum will be announced at 9 p.m. EDT in New York by U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan. The pro-independence vote is expected to be more than 85 percent.

This violence was predictable and preventable. It's not just a tragedy. It's a betrayal of the East Timorese who braved everything to vote. Sidney Jones   Asia Director of Human Rights Watch

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"It's too late for any international force," said Sidney Jones, Asia director of Human Rights Watch. "The slaughter's happening now." She said the Indonesian army, which created the anti-independence militias responsible for violence, was now the only force that could stop them. "And the only way the Indonesian army is going to act responsibly is for Indonesia's major donors, including the U.S., Australia, and Japan, to pull out every stop they've got—and that includes suspending aid."  
 
She said all non-humanitarian aid, including direct budgetary support to the government, had to be stopped and resumed only when the violence was brought under control.  
 
By Friday night in East Timor, anti-independence militias were said to have set two towns ablaze in Maliana and Ermera districts, both west of Dili, the capital. The main market in Dili was also on fire, and militia members had reportedly taken over a broadcasting station. Australian radio was reporting twenty killed in Maliana, after the United Nations Mission in East Timor (UNAMET) evacuated all staff there yesterday.  
 
"This violence was predictable and preventable," said Jones. "It's not just a tragedy. It's a betrayal of the East Timorese who braved everything to vote."