/** reg.easttimor: 2716.0 **/

** Topic: Situation in Suai desperate, 100 feared killed today! **
** Written 11:31 PM Sep 5, 1999 by ronh@online.no in cdp:reg.easttimor **
From: "Ronny Hansen" <ronh@online.no>
Subject: Situation in Suai desperate, 100 feared killed today!


Friends of East Timor, After reading an article from ABC this morning about the situation in Suai, I decided to give the mentioned priest a call. I was in Suai on an observer mission for the IFET observer project just two weeks ago and was appalled at seeing the conditions that the more than 2300 refugees inside the church were living under. According to the church, a further 5000 refugees (or IDPs, in UN- speak) were living elsewhere in the town. i spoke with the priest on several occasions, and found him a very sincere and trustworthy man.

When I spoke to him just now, Padre Francisco Soares was apparently very distressed and frightened and said that the militias had just attacked the church compound, killing an estimated 100 -one hundred- people, surrounding the perimeter of the compound and not allowing anyone to leave the grounds. The police was not doing anything, he said. He repeated several times that the situation is very, very bad and that someone has to do something to stop it.

I must mention that the phone line to Suai is quite bad and that the whole conversation was very hurried because of his stress and alarm. I asked him to please speak up and repeat what he said, and he repeated the number one hundred killed several times over to make sure I got it. I said it back to him and he confirmed it. It is stil possible that I may have gotten something wrong, and I apologize if I did, but I thought the information provided was so alarming and distressing that I had to get it out to you very quickly so that you can act on it. Please do act now! I circulated a list of contacts to Indonesian and world leaders, militia leaders, the UN and so on last night. Please use it and inform me if you find it to contain important errors or omissions.

I'll keep you posted on developments.

Sincerely,


Ronny Hansen Coordinator Norwegian Cooperation Council for East Timor and Indonesia Tel: 92 80 86 07 work 22 68 28 88 priv. Fax: 92 97 86 07 e- mail: ronh@online.no http://www.egroups.com/group/timor-indonesia-nordic http://home.telia.no/timor