MARK DORIS,
Sir, - Gearoid Kilgallen (August 29th) is correct to commend Mary Robinson's stance in calling for an international tribunal on East Timor..
He is also right to link abuses there to 40 years of horrific abuses in West Papua - which still awaits its chance to vote to take a seat at the United Nations.
The military commander in West Papua is one Maj-Gen Mahidin Simbolon, who "is himself accused of atrocities in Timor" (The Irish Times, September 2nd).
Jane's Intelligence Review says Simbolon "has been identified by Western intelligence sources as the main link between the Indonesian Army and the East Timorese militias". In Australian intelligence intercepts, a pro-integration militia group in East Timor is referred to as "his crew".
Simbolon presides over a regime in West Papua which has seen the recent assassination of leader Theys Eluay, whose non-violent movement is currently facing a brutal crackdown. In August, the general told a group of soldiers returning from West Papua: "We must kill as many of our enemies as possible. Human rights are something we must not worry about but must consider." (Jakarta Post, August 16th.)
Inaction and silence on the absence of justice in East Timor and West Papua will help give the go-ahead for further rape, extra-judicial killings and torture at the hands of the Indonesian military and their militias in West Papua. - Yours etc.,
MARK DORIS,
Co-ordinator,
West Papua Action,
Dublin 7.