page_title: International Force East Timor
section_title: United Nations resolution
hierarchical_section_title: International Force East Timor / United Nations resolution
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Xanana Gusmão trifft in Aileu nach seiner Freilassung aus indonesischer Gefangenschaft im Oktober 1999 auf seine Kameraden von der FALINTIL.
context_page_description: The International Force East Timor was a multinational non-United Nations peacemaking taskforce, organised and led by Australia in accordance with United Nations resolutions to address the humanitarian and security crisis that took place in East Timor from 1999–2000 until the arrival of UN peacekeepers. INTERFET was commanded by an Australian military officer, Major General Peter Cosgrove.
context_section_description: The violence was met with widespread public anger in Australia, Portugal and elsewhere, and activists in Portugal, Australia, the United States and other nations pressured their governments to take action. Australia's Opposition Spokesman on Foreign Affairs, Laurie Brereton, was vocal in highlighting evidence of the Indonesian military's involvement in pro-integrationist violence and advocated United Nations peacekeeping to support the East Timor's ballot. The Catholic Church in Australia urged the Australian Government to send an armed peacekeeping force to East Timor to end the violence. Protests occurred outside the Indonesia Consulate in Darwin and the Indonesian Embassy in Canberra.
  The Australian prime minister, John Howard, gained the support of United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan and U.S. President Bill Clinton for an Australian-led international peacekeeping force to enter East Timor to end the violence. On 12 September, Clinton announced:
  [T]he Indonesian military has aided and abetted militia violence in East Timor, in violation of the commitment of its leaders to the international community. This has allowed the militias to murder innocent people, to send thousands fleeing for their lives, to attack the United Nations compound. The United States has suspended all military cooperation, assistance, and sales to Indonesia ... The Indonesian Government and military must not only stop what they are doing but reverse course. They must halt the violence not just in Dili but throughout the nation. They must permit humanitarian assistance and let the U.N. mission do its job ... We are ready to support an effort led by Australia to mobilize a multinational force to help to bring security to East Timor under U.N. auspice ... the eyes of the world are on that tiny place and on those poor innocent, suffering people.
  Indonesia, in dire economic straits, relented. Under international pressure to allow an international peacekeeping force, President B.J. Habibie announced on 12 September that he would do so. He told a press conference:
  A couple of minutes ago I called the United Nations Secretary General, Mr Kofi Annan, to inform about our readiness to accept international peacekeeping forces through the United Nations, from friendly nations, to restore peace and security in East Timor.
  On 15 September 1999, the United Nations Security Council expressed concern at the deteriorating situation in East Timor and issued its Resolution 1264 calling for a multinational force to restore peace and security to East Timor, to protect and support the United Nations mission there, and to facilitate humanitarian assistance operations until such time as a United Nations peacekeeping force could be approved and deployed in the area. The resolution also welcomed Australia's letter to accept the leadership of a proposed multinational force in East Timor and to make a substantial contribution to the force itself.
caption: Return of Xanana Gusmão from Indonesian prison (1999).
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