All international trade with Indonesia should cease immediately until the military-backed militia terror in East Timor comes to an end, Mr Tom Hyland, co-ordinator of the East Timor Ireland Solidarity Campaign, has said.
"It is time to stop treating Indonesia as an honest broker. There is no question the Indonesian military is behind these militia attacks and without the strongest international pressure they will continue to murder with impunity. Make no mistake, they will kill every man, woman and child in East Timor.
"Every form of pressure must be activated from the freezing of World Bank and IMF funding to the boycotting of Indonesian goods and holiday resorts like Bali."
Mr Hyland said he spoke yesterday to East Timorese friends sheltering in the UN compound in Dili who talked of "unbelievable horrors". One friend, he said, "rang just to say good-bye".
The campaign is holding a demonstration in Dublin today and has urged people to contact key diplomatic representations here to call for immediate military intervention.
The British, American and Australian embassies said yesterday they had already received hundreds of phone calls and faxes from members of the public.
"The East Timorese have been betrayed by the international community," said Mr Hyland. "The UN said that if people braved the intimidation and terror they would be protected. Now they are reneging on their promise."
He said it was particularly important the UN established the whereabouts of the scores of East Timorese who were bused away from their homes at gunpoint by militia. "The UN has to move now to stop these people ending up in mass graves. One has to have the utmost respect for UN personnel on the ground but their efforts are not being matched by political leaders in New York and around the world who have no sense of urgency about the situation and are only showing the pretence of concern."
Mr Hyland said the Government needed to clarify whether it supported immediate UN military intervention.
He said it should also "give a clear and unequivocal statement that Ireland will use its position at the World Bank to veto all financial aid to Indonesia".
Echoing this appeal, the chairman of Trocaire, Bishop John Kirby, who recently visited East Timor, said he had "never been so dismayed at the inaction of the international community".
He said the UN was allowing itself to be forced out of East Timor so that Indonesia could continue its "awful project to overturn the result of a free vote and make the territory ungovernable".
Irish Congress of Trade Unions also said the IMF and World Bank should cancel all loans to Indonesia "until they accept their responsibility to protect the basic human rights of the East Timorese".
The East Timor Ireland Solidarity Campaign protest takes place today between 5.30 p.m. and 7 p.m. outside the British Embassy, Merrion Road, Dublin.
