The UN mission in East Timor needs all the help it can get, writes John Sanderson. To a people already traumatised by the destruction and killing before the departure of the Indonesian Army, the signs are deeply disturbing. A lack of food, high prices in the markets and a very slow emergence of the jobs foreshadowed in the international community's early flush of commitment to reconstruction compound their anxiety.
Families are worried about building a future for their children.
Major-General Peter Cosgrove and his Interfet troops will be gone before the end of February. They have done an outstanding job of seeing off the militia and creating the conditions for the safe return of the East Timorese to their homes. Yet while their task has been very challenging, they have had the easy part of the rebuilding of this society that has never governed itself. The mandate given to it by the Security Council empowers the Special Representative of the Secretary-General, Sergio de Mello, to exercise all legislative and executive authority, including the administration of justice. His powers equal those of a governor under the old colonial systems.