by Ganesh Sahathevan
The following reports are presented as extracts with links to the original.
Where links are not available, the original has been copied and pasted.
Captain Andrew Plunkett: The analysis was that the TNI would basically destroy East Timor and they’d use militia as proxies. It was quite clear the link between the militia and TNI and the militia being bit players, small pawns, and it was quite clear that they would kill a lot of people and destroy their infrastructure straight after the autonomy ballot, if it won independence. It was quite clear from the analysis and the reporting and the information that was coming out of East Timor. But unfortunately by the time it left the military, and went up the chain of command, in effect to foreign affairs, it wasn’t pushed down to the UN or the Australian UN observers on the ground.
But it wasn’t just agencies in Australia gathering this information. Intelligence staff on the ground such as Wayne Sievers were gathering their own.
He and others were collecting leaked Indonesian documents and feeding them into the UNAMET structure.
What were these documents and reports indicating?
Wayne Sievers: They were indicating that indeed it was the Indonesian military at the highest levels that were organising, arming, training and funding the militias at a time when they were supposed to be disarming them and protecting us. I started to get increasingly worried because there seemed to be a culture of denial in the UN and their reaction was to this kind of information, to these reports was, “Oh, it’s alarmist talking, it’s misinformation from the independent side. We have to accept the assurances that the Indonesian authorities have given us.” And I got really worried about that.
The evidence according to then Major General Duncan Lewis,current head of ASIO:
As reported by Kyodo News
Brig. Gen. Duncan Lewis, the commander of the 2,000-strong Australian contingent based along the border, was quoted as saying there could be rogue Indonesian military elements in West Timor.
"If there are elements who hold a different view to the central government then it's quite a concern and very dangerous if that situation exists," he was quoted as saying.
As reported by the Independent UK
" Brigadier Lewis said that the bodies of two armed men killed in a gun battle with UN soldiers on Wednesday carried FKS rifles which are used only by the Indonesian army. Indonesian military surplus can be bought throughout the country. "But what I find distressing is that some of their equipment was relatively new," he said.
It is clear from a comparison of the t Kyodo and Independent reports that Duncan Lewis was obviously conflicted,unable to accept that the TNI,whose leadership he knows well, could have been in any way involved in the massacres despite the evidence before him. This again suggests a man who had been compromised.
It is important to recall that Bapak Lewis, as our Duncan is known in Jakarta , was sent back to Jakarta as military attache in 1999, and was thus responsible for the intelligence the then Howard Government was receiving ,prior to the attacks.
These concern the Timor massacres ,which many say Australia encouraged by initially turning a blind eye.The evidence ,according to then Captain Andrew Plunkett, Australian Army Intelligence, and others, reported by Mark Davis on Dateline:
Captain Andrew Plunkett: The analysis was that the TNI would basically destroy East Timor and they’d use militia as proxies. It was quite clear the link between the militia and TNI and the militia being bit players, small pawns, and it was quite clear that they would kill a lot of people and destroy their infrastructure straight after the autonomy ballot, if it won independence. It was quite clear from the analysis and the reporting and the information that was coming out of East Timor. But unfortunately by the time it left the military, and went up the chain of command, in effect to foreign affairs, it wasn’t pushed down to the UN or the Australian UN observers on the ground.
But it wasn’t just agencies in Australia gathering this information. Intelligence staff on the ground such as Wayne Sievers were gathering their own.
He and others were collecting leaked Indonesian documents and feeding them into the UNAMET structure.
What were these documents and reports indicating?
Wayne Sievers: They were indicating that indeed it was the Indonesian military at the highest levels that were organising, arming, training and funding the militias at a time when they were supposed to be disarming them and protecting us. I started to get increasingly worried because there seemed to be a culture of denial in the UN and their reaction was to this kind of information, to these reports was, “Oh, it’s alarmist talking, it’s misinformation from the independent side. We have to accept the assurances that the Indonesian authorities have given us.” And I got really worried about that.
The evidence according to then Major General Duncan Lewis,current head of ASIO:
As reported by Kyodo News
Brig. Gen. Duncan Lewis, the commander of the 2,000-strong Australian contingent based along the border, was quoted as saying there could be rogue Indonesian military elements in West Timor.
"If there are elements who hold a different view to the central government then it's quite a concern and very dangerous if that situation exists," he was quoted as saying.
As reported by the Independent UK
" Brigadier Lewis said that the bodies of two armed men killed in a gun battle with UN soldiers on Wednesday carried FKS rifles which are used only by the Indonesian army. Indonesian military surplus can be bought throughout the country. "But what I find distressing is that some of their equipment was relatively new," he said.
It is clear from a comparison of the t Kyodo and Independent reports that Duncan Lewis was obviously conflicted,unable to accept that the TNI,whose leadership he knows well, could have been in any way involved in the massacres despite the evidence before him. This again suggests a man who had been compromised.
It is important to recall that Bapak Lewis, as our Duncan is known in Jakarta , was sent back to Jakarta as military attache in 1999, and was thus responsible for the intelligence the then Howard Government was receiving ,prior to the attacks.
His involvement in the disinformation needs to be investigated, and no amount of false praise ("best in the world" is being thrown about like confetti ) will change what has been on the public record for more than a decade.
END
Bounty on heads of Timor peacekeepers: paper
329 words
28 July 2000
14:17
KYODO
English
Copyright Kyodo News International Inc. 2000
SYDNEY, July 28 --
A price has been put on the heads of Australian and New Zealand peacekeepers serving in East Timor, an Australian daily reported Friday.
The Sydney Morning Herald quoted senior U.N. officials as saying the ears of a New Zealand soldier killed by suspected militia on Monday were cut off as a bounty trophy.
The officials were quoted as saying a bounty of between 1.5 million and 2 million rupiah ($165-$220) was likely paid to members of the Laksaur militia believed responsible for the death of Pvt. Leonard Manning, the first combat casualty of the U.N. peacekeeping operation in East Timor.
"It was a bounty; payment was involved," said one of the officers, who spoke to the daily on condition of anonymity.
The officials said they had received information from militia sources in West Timor that the reward was probably being offered by senior pro-integration figures as an incentive to keep their cause alive.
The U.N.-sponsored military operation began in East Timor last September after violence by militias loyal to Jakarta devastated the territory following an overwhelming vote for independence from Indonesia.
Manning was found dead after going missing during a gunbattle, near the West Timorese border, between a New Zealand patrol and what are believed to have been professionally trained militia from Indonesian territory.
A range of Indonesian military equipment -- including standard-issue military fatigues with a shirt bearing the special forces patch -- was found near the attack site, located close to the border town of Suai, the Herald reported.
Brig. Gen. Duncan Lewis, the commander of the 2,000-strong Australian contingent based along the border, was quoted as saying their could be rogue Indonesian military elements in West Timor.
"If there are elements who hold a different view to the central government then it's quite a concern and very dangerous if that situation exists," he was quoted as saying.
Document kyodo00020010807dw7s012t1
Indonesian special forces `killed UN peace-keeper in East Timor'.
By Richard Lloyd Parry and Joanna Jolly in Dili.
521 words
4 August 2000
IND
12
English
(c) 2000 Independent Newspapers (UK) Limited . All rights reserved. This material may not be published, distributed or exploited in any way.
A UNITED NATIONS peace-keeper who died in East Timor last month was shot by former members of the Indonesian special forces under the noses of the Indonesian authorities, military sources in Dili say.
Private Leonard Manning,from New Zealand, was killedon 24 July after an attack on East Timor's border with Indonesia that showed all the hallmarks of a military ambush carried out by trained soldiers.
In a sweep of the area after the attack, UN forces found a backpack containing military rations and survival equipment, as well as a shirt bearing the insignia of Kopassus, the special forces, which established a murderous reputation in the 24 years after the Indonesian invasion of East Timor in 1975.
They also found the body of Private Manning, whose throat had been cut and his ears severed, another Kopassus trademark. The uniforms worn by the attackers were plain green rather than the more common camouflage style, and they also wore balaclavas, rather than the motley assortment of headgear that are favoured by the civilian militiamen.
UN sources in Dili told The Independent they believe the attackers were members of Kopassus who have been officially discharged, and who have travelled to West Timor to undermine East Timorese independence.
In public, UN sources have diplomatically refrained from suggesting that the Indonesians are helping the militias, but in the past few days that restraint has come close to breaking point.
The head of the UN administration in East Timor, Sergio Vieira de Mello, has made repeated requests for the Indonesians to restrain the militias, but to little effect.
"I'm not saying that they've done nothing, but [their efforts] are not sufficient," he said. "Had they disarmed, demobilised and arrested those 200 to 300 extremists that continue to enjoy freedom of movement on the other side of the border, Private Manning would be alive today."
Brigadier Duncan Lewis, a commander with the UN force, said: "We have gunmen that have been coming across the border since February when our force started operations here in East Timor. They have been coming across the border wearing Indonesian uniforms, carrying a range of weapons and ammunition that has Indonesian origin and you would have to make your own conclusions from that." Brigadier Lewis said that the bodies of two armed men killed in a gun battle with UN soldiers on Wednesday carried FKS rifles which are used only by the Indonesian army. Indonesian military surplus can be bought throughout the country. "But what I find distressing is that some of their equipment was relatively new," he said.
East Timor voted overwhelmingly for independence in a referendum last August after a campaign in which there was blatant intimidation by supporters of Indonesia, backed by the military. In the two weeks of violence that followed the vote, Indonesian soldiers operated openly alongside militiamen.
In an unrelated incident, a Bangladeshi peace-keeper in East Timor was killed yesterday by a bomb, while searching for unexploded munitions on a beach near Dili.
Document ind0000020010811dw840019h
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