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Calling for an international tribunal, Bishop Belo said: "Hopefully through the United Nations framework, these people should be taken into a tribunal like for Kosovo, for Bosnia, because the crimes committed here are really crimes against humanity."
Mr Horta, who shared the Nobel prize with Bishop Belo, said the former head of the Indonesian armed forces, General Wiranto, and other senior commanders should be made answerable for crimes against humanity.
"You cannot in this day and age, at the end of the 20th Century, plan an orderly destruction of a whole country, the abduction of thousands of people, the killing the rape, and get away with it with impunity," Mr Horta said.
"It would be an affront to humanity if Wiranto and the others retired peacefully and nothing happened," he added.
Finding the facts
Mass grave sites have already been uncovered in East Timor, though no authoritative figure has been given for the number of people who died in the last weeks of Indonesian rule over East Timor.
The UN has recently sent a fact finding mission to East Timor to investigate the alleged human rights abuses committed by the Indonesia military and pro-Jakarta militias in the period after the territory voted for independence in August. It will report to the UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan.
An Indonesian commission of inquiry into human rights violations has also launched an investigation.
Both inquiry teams have said gathered testimony pointed to the responsibility of senior army generals in planning and executing the violence that engulfed East Timor before Indonesia pulled out.
Though the Indonesian team has surprised many with its apparent honesty and willingness to criticises its own military, Bishop Belo dismissed its efforts.
"I do not have confidence in Indonesian institutions," he said.
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