ABC AUSTRALIA, Saturday, January 7, 2006. 10:42pm (AEDT)
Ex-militiamen killed on Indonesian border
East Timorese police have shot dead three former pro-Indonesian militiamen at the
border with Indonesia, the military and a witness says.
They say the three had adopted Indonesian citizenship after East Timor voted for
independence in 1999.
The trio had been fishing in a river separating East Timor and Indonesia when they
encountered border police.
Two other people with them managed to escape.
"They were 50 metres into East Timorese territory," Indonesian border commander
Lieutenant Colonel Ediwan Prabowo said.
"We still don't know why they were shot."
Indonesian Foreign Ministry spokesman Yuri Thamrin is calling for a joint investigation
into the incident.
Egidio, 15, one of the intruders who escaped, says border guards recognised one of
the three as as ex-militia men.
"They fired warning shots and we ran. Then they shot at us," he said.
Marcos Soares, the brother of Candido Mariano, one of the three killed, admits that
they were former members of a militia group called Red and White Iron.
An estimated 250,000 people fled or were forcibly transported by pro-Jakarta militia
gangs across the border to West Timor during the violence that surrounded East
Timor's August 1999 UN-sponsored independence vote.
Most have since returned to East Timor but around 16,000 opted to remain in
Indonesia.
- AFP
© ABC 2005 |
