SEPTEMBER 4, 2000 VOL. 156 NO. 9

Stephen Dupont/Contact Press Images for TIME. Enterprising Australian businessmen have set up a variety of businesses in Dili, including this Harvey Norman electrical appliance store.

The Price of Freedom
A year after its tumultuous birth, East Timor struggles to become a full-fledged nation
By JASON TEDJASUKMANA Dili

One year ago Adelina Mesquita watched as five men broke into her house and hacked her husband to death with machetes. The thugs set fire to her home, with the corpse still inside, but allowed Adelina to live. "They said they would let me go so that I could suffer for the rest of my life," says the forlorn mother of two, sitting on the concrete block that is all that remains of her house in the East Timorese city of Suai.

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Thousands are similarly haunted by the orgy of destruction that accompanied the withdrawal of Jakarta's troops and their lackey militias from East Timor last year, after the former Indonesian territory voted for independence. As many as 1,200 people were killed in the period leading up to and just after the August 1999 referendum. An additional 250,000 people—a third of the population—fled to the mountains for safety or were forced over the border by militias. Three-quarters of East Timor's homes and businesses were razed. A year later, very few of those buildings have been rebuilt, and some 100,000 refugees still fill squalid camps across the border in West Timor. After militia members attacked three of its workers there last week, the United Nations halted all operations in the refugee camps. Fears that the violence could spread over the border have led to heightened security measures in the East Timorese capital of Dili.

The citizens of the world's newest country could be forgiven for wondering if their suffering will ever end. U.N.-sponsored troops have brought the territory its first taste of peace in decades. But many worry that the foundations needed to build on that peace are not being laid properly. So far the record of the U.N., which was invited by former Indonesian President B.J. Habibie to set up a transitional government in East Timor 10 months ago, is spotty. Local leaders complain that they have not been involved enough in the development of a new political structure for the country. The presence of thousands of foreign aid workers has driven up prices in the capital. The taxes that the U.N. has imposed on goods and services, ports and cross-border trading threaten to increase the cost of doing business in a country that is desperate for foreign investment. "The U.N. does not understand the culture of the people," says Avelino Coelho, secretary general of the Timor Socialist Party. He complains that the U.N. meets with his group only occasionally, for the sake of appearances.

Some of the country's most pressing needs have yet to be filled. Many of Dili's largest and worst-hit neighborhoods have not been rebuilt; locals still squat in front of gutted buildings, selling bread, cigarettes and instant noodles. The U.N. says it's not responsible. "Housing does not fall under the U.N. mandate," says Pedro Reis, the head of the mission's facilities unit. "The best incentive we can give is to provide jobs so the Timorese can get their lives going again." (The jobs available in Dili, however, are mostly for taxi drivers, waiters and domestic helpers in the overpriced motels set up by enterprising Australian businessmen.) The task of rebuilding the estimated 80,000 homes destroyed in last year's violence has fallen instead to the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, and its officials worry about the nation's dire needs. "We're concerned that someone should be taking over this responsibility," says John Weir, the High Commissioner's shelter coordinator. The organization has provided the materials for more than 10,000 simple houses. But officials fear the housing problem could become critical if more are not built before the arrival of the rainy season in November.

Stephen Dupont/Contact Press Images for TIME. East Timorese children play amid the wreckage at Dili.

Even the peace imposed by some 7,600 U.N. troops is somewhat precarious. In recent months, former militia members returning from West Timor have launched grenade attacks on isolated military posts and clashed with peacekeepers on patrol: two soldiers were killed in the past month. (Officials insist both deaths were the result of "chance encounters" rather than any organized upsurge in violence.) Some former militia members have crossed the border to steal cattle; others are believed to be rallying support to take over the western border region of East Timor. Like their counterparts across the border, U.N. authorities in East Timor blame Jakarta for not reining in the renegades. "We're concerned with the seeming inability of Indonesian authorities to target the militia leadership," says Brigadier-General Duncan Lewis, commander of peacekeeping forces on the border with West Timor. Fear of the thugs has kept most villagers in the western countryside indoors at night.

But even those traumatized citizens would admit that East Timor has crossed a watershed. In Dili, judges are being trained to hand down their first convictions of militia members now in detention. The first batch of 50 Timorese police graduated in July. And the U.N. will soon appoint deputies to oversee national planning, government supervision and the environment. "We have accomplished the mission of liberating our homeland," independence leader Xanana Gusmao told his former comrades-in-arms at a celebration last week. "Politicians, intellectuals and civil society will proceed with the mission of liberating our people from misery, ignorance, hunger and disease." For East Timor's long-suffering people, that mission cannot be accomplished too soon.

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