The New York Times

Thursday, September 21, 2000

Need for Food by Refugees in West Timor Is Worsening

By CALVIN SIMS

JAKARTA, Indonesia, Sept. 20 - Tens of thousands of East Timor refugees living in squalid camps on the West Timor border face starvation by the end of the month, government officials and aid workers on the divided island said today.

The officials called for quick intervention from the Indonesian government or the international community, saying they feared violence if the refugees became desperate for food.

International aid organizations had been providing some food and medical assistance to the camps. But those groups withdrew from West Timor early this month after the vicious killings of three United Nations workers by militiamen linked to the Indonesian military.

With little medicine and with food and water supplies dwindling, conditions for the estimated 120,000 refugees in the camps are deteriorating.

"There is only enough food to last for a few more weeks, and after that people will start to starve," Petrus Ribero, head of the Indonesian Red Cross in Kupang, the West Timor capital, said in a telephone interview. Mr. Ribero said that though Red Cross workers are no longer being harassed by the militias and are freely visiting the camps, they do not have enough supplies to distribute. He said the refugees are particularly in need of housing now that the rainy season has begun.

Hundreds of thousands of people fled East Timor last year when pro- Indonesia militia groups went on a killing rampage after the territory voted for independence from Indonesia. Aid groups have said they will not return to West Timor until Indonesia improves security there.

In an effort to address international concerns about his military, President Abdurrahman Wahid today fired the deputy commander of the armed forces, Gen. Fachrul Razi. The general's dismissal came just two days after Mr. Wahid replaced the national police chief for failing to resolve a series of bomb attacks and growing unrest.

But the military, which effectively ruled Indonesia for 32 years under Suharto, the former dictator, still exercises considerable power, and the removal of one general is not expected to change much. Indeed, some political analysts said that the dismissal was intended more to address international threats of sanctions than to restructure the armed forces, which have played a heavy hand in regional and religious violence.

Government officials have said the military is fanning the fires of unrest to derail the prosecution of Mr. Suharto on corruption charges and of military officials for human rights abuses in East Timor.

On Tuesday Indonesia's top security minister, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, told the United Nations Security Council in New York that the armed forces would start forcibly disarming the militias if they did not surrender their weapons by next Tuesday.

But Mr. Yudhoyono said Indonesia still did not plan to receive a United Nations delegation that wants to visit West Timor to see what the government is doing to disband the militias and prosecute those responsible for the deaths of the aid workers.

With the withdrawal of the United Nations and most international aid organizations from West Timor, the refugees are more vulnerable than ever. Father Alex, a Catholic priest at a church in Atambua that was involved in distributing food to the camps, said that militiamen continue to roam the streets without any interference from the military and that some militiamen are stopping vehicles to extort food and money.

"As of today, I have not seen any evidence of the security forces disarming the militia," Father Alex said in a telephone interview. "I fear more violence because the refugees would do anything, including rampaging on the church or government offices or commercial warehouses where food and supplies are located."

The head of West Timor's social services department, Yos Mamulak, said the local government had distributed 1,040 metric tons of rice - about 2.9 million pounds, the last of its stock - to the camps on Sept. 9. He noted, however, that to feed the estimated 120,000 refugees, the agency needed more than five million pounds.

Mr. Mamulak said that the provincial government was waiting for more supplies from the central government and that he hoped the militia and refugees would not resort to violence. "It is terrifying for us here," he said.