REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, KUPANG - Head of Aswain Timor Union (Untas), Eurico Guterres, said the recently established fact-finding team only "reopened an old wound". Untas is an organization of East Timorese people living in Indonesia.

"Why in the early days of his administration, SBY (President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono) had invited Xanana Gusmao to establish Friendship and Truth Commission (KKP) between Indonesia and Timor Leste. However, prior to the end of his administration, SBY has established a fact-finding team to 'reopen an old wound'," he said on Tuesday.

Guterres said the team should not only search for the bones of the former president of Timor Leste, Fretilin Nicolay dos Reis Lobato, but also those of pro-Indonesian fighters. If the Indonesian government has money to find bones, it should also be used to look for the remains of pro-Indonesian fighters who were murdered in Viqueque, he noted.

"The plan to search is good, but to look only for Lobato's bones is unfair," Guterres argued.

A KKP recommendation signed by SBY and Xanana in Bali in July 2008 clearly states that the two countries will forget the past, and look at more a peaceful future, he pointed out.

Instead of establishing the fact-finding team led by former army general Agum Gumelar, who had once been assigned in East Timor, the government should forthright announce the location of Lobato's remains to save time, energy, and money, he noted.

Untas has planned to send a letter to the fact-finding team asking for clarification and also providing a list of names of the pro-Indonesian fighters who had been killed by Fretilin, he added.

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