News and Analysis - East Timor – Failed Australian Assault and a Continuing Crisis, 04 Mar 2007

Australian military forces including Special Air Services (SAS) troops launched a failed assault on Sunday against the compound where renegade Major Alfredo Reinaldo had been ensconced over the last week. While Major Reinaldo eluded capture, four of his supporters were killed during the operation and an unknown number detained. Major Reinaldo has been on the run from security forces since his jailbreak, along with 56 other prisoners, in August of last year. Reinaldo, part of a group of disaffected soldiers, was incarcerated on charges that he led an attack in May 2006 on a group of “loyalist” troops and police. (He surrendered to authorities in June 2006.) Earlier this week, he was finally brought to ground in the village of Same where he was joined by a number of supporters. The Australians surrounded the area and through intermediaries negotiated for his surrender. When it became evident that Reinaldo was going to force the issue by not turning himself in, the Australians gained approval from the East Timor government to use force if necessary. The current situation is a direct result of fractures within the armed forces and Timorese society that broke into open conflict almost a year ago.

(Comment -- The fighting last year began when approximately 600 soldiers of the East Timor Defense force, recruited mostly from the western part of the country, protested what they felt were discriminatory practices within the Armed Forces. Former Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri dismissed these soldiers, precipitating a clash between various factions of the security forces including the police. The violence spread as rival youth gangs clashed and took the fight into Dili neighborhoods burning houses and forcing people from their homes. With UN approval, Australian and New Zealand troops were deployed to end the fighting, but before it could be brought under control, the violence resulted in 37 deaths and caused more than 150,000 persons to be internally displaced. Prime Minister Alkatiri and Minister of Interior Rogerio Lobato were removed from office, and Lobato is now being prosecuted for illegally arming a number of civilians who were involved in the fighting. Although UN sanctioned forces, including over a thousand Portuguese police, were largely successful in bringing calm to the capital, the situation in East Timor remains explosive. The Renaldo incident is just one part of a bigger cauldron of unrest: a recent rice shortage caused new demonstrations; over the last week and half, Australian soldiers shot and killed three youths in their efforts to quell localized violence, the deep divide between easterners and westerners remains; and politically, East Timor is readying for Presidential elections scheduled for April 9th that could easily act as a catalyst for further unrest. In summary, the fractures that broke out in the open last year continue to run just under the surface and will continue to flare up and haunt the country for the foreseeable future. The long term solution for East Timor is economic development that will create job opportunities for the large numbers of Timorese youth who are unemployed or underemployed, and time, which will slowly heal the wounds that have been inflicted on Timorese society ever since the Dutch were expelled by the Indonesian Armed Forces in 1975. [slr]