Evacuees reaching Darwin in northern Australia described Dili as a city of fear last night, with hundreds of severed human heads on sticks erected on roads leading out of the East Timorese capital.
President B.J. Habibie has imposed martial law in East Timor, the Kyodo news agency reported today quoting the military spokesman, Brig Gen Sudradjat. The report was not confirmed.
Hundreds of people are feared to have died in the terror inflicted by pro-Indonesia militia and the Indonesian army, the TNI.
A five-member team of Filipino doctors returned to Manila yesterday after fleeing in an ambulance driven by a nun. They said they treated about 300 people, many with gunshot wounds, in a clinic run by a Catholic charity.
The increasingly vicious campaign against the people of East Timor by the Indonesia-supported militias reached new lows yesterday. In one instance, weeping refugees were marched around Dili by Aitarak militia and TNI soldiers.
Last night, a mass of people huddled together for protection in the headquarters of UNAMET, the United Nations Mission in East Timor.
At nightfall, gunfire over the city had died down but the sound of a group of young girls could be heard, quietly singing Ave Maria.
The extent of the carnage in East Timor was admitted, at least to some extent, by the authorities in Jakarta when the official news agency acknowledged that pro-Indonesia militiamen killed 30 people in an attack on the home of Bishop Carlos Belo, the Nobel Peace laureate.
Some 6,000 refugees had sought sanctuary there, according to the news agency, Antara. East Timor's main spiritual leader was evacuated by helicopter to the eastern city of Baucau after his house was set on fire.
The attack on his home in Dili was just one of several incidents yesterday that prompted an international outcry and demands for a peacekeeping force.
The UN Secretary-General, Mr Kofi Annan, said the world community would have to consider "other measures" to keep order if Indonesia's declaration of martial law, which he said was planned, did not produce results.
A five-member UN Security Council mission from Britain, Slovenia, Malaysia, Namibia and the Netherlands left for Indonesia late yesterday to press for action against the militias.
Last night, the US said it supported an Australian suggestion for a force. Australia said that Indonesian approval would be necessary, a prerequisite that seems unlikely to be met by Jakarta.
Washington later urged Jakarta to accept foreign intervention.
Earlier yesterday, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mrs Mary Robinson, said the world could not stand idly by and allow a campaign of terror and massacre to be waged against people for having exercised their democratic rights.
Far from backing off, there are indications that Indonesia will ratchet up its military involvement in East Timor. Indonesia's armed forces chief, Gen Wiranto, has asked his government to declare a state of emergency, which would be tantamount to introducing martial law in East Timor.
Gen Wiranto said extra troops would be sent to bring under control "the two parties" which are fighting there.
The head of UNAMET, Mr Ian Martin, said that he was committed to staying but he did not know how long he could hold out.
In Geneva, a Red Cross spokesman, Mr Urs Boegli, said 11 international staff had been marched from the Red Cross compound beside Bishop Belo's house and handed over to the Indonesian authorities at a police station.
Dozens of people were cut and torn by razor wire as they panicked at a refugee centre at the sound of heavy gunfire from nearby militias and scrambled to escape into the compound housing UNAMET. Many of the refugees were rounded up by militias and Indonesia's armed forces and forcibly moved to West Timor.
Australia yesterday began evacuating almost half of the remaining 433-strong UNAMET staff.