East Timor: Torture and Mistreatment by Police
Government Must Check Abuse Before It Spreads
(Dili) – The East Timorese government needs to urgently address the problem of police torture and ill-treatment of
detainees before it becomes widespread, Human Rights Watch said in a new report released today. Independent and internal
accountability mechanisms need to be greatly strengthened to stop a slide into impunity for officials who commit abuses.
The 50-page report, “Tortured Beginnings: Police Violence and the Beginnings of Impunity in East Timor,” is based on
dozens of interviews with witnesses and victims of police abuse in East Timor. It documents excessive force during
arrests, torture and ill-treatment of detainees by the National Police of East Timor (PNTL). Several people interviewed
had to be hospitalized because of the severity of their injuries.
“We were shocked to find so many credible accounts of torture and severe ill-treatment by police officers,” said Brad
Adams, Asia director for Human Rights Watch. “East Timor won independence in part because of Indonesia’s horrific record
here. Now some people are saying that the new police force is no better than the old one, and this should worry the
government.”
One young man told Human Rights Watch what happened to him when he was arrested in his village, near the town of
Maliana:
“I was arrested by the PNTL, and put in a cell for two days and two nights. I was continuously tortured, sprayed with
pepper spray, beaten and drenched with water. They constantly threatened me, saying ‘if you oppose the police then you
will know the consequence.’ Three police officers came into the cell, locked the door, took off their jackets, then hit
me. They were all Maliana PNTL. They were the night guards, and were wearing PNTL uniforms. On the first night they beat
me at around 1:00 a.m., on the second night they beat me around 3:00 a.m. Both nights were different people, but both
times they were beating me.”
Police and other state institutions in East Timor also regularly fail to respond appropriately to incidents of police
abuse. The main internal police oversight body, the Professional Ethics and Deontology Unit (PEDU), often fails to take
cases of police abuse seriously, to follow up with complaints, or properly discipline the officers involved. Independent
bodies that could take up cases of police abuse are ineffective and lack sufficient material or political support to
succeed.
“East Timor’s leaders are ignoring police abuse when they should be taking urgent steps to end it,” said Adams. “The
people of East Timor have the right to expect better treatment from their own police force.”
Human Rights Watch called on the East Timorese government to:
• Ensure through public measures and statements that there is a clear, unambiguous and consistent signal from the
top that police use of torture, arbitrary detention, and excessive force will not be tolerated.
• Take swift and meaningful action against police officers who torture, arbitrarily detain, or use excessive force
against the population, including appropriate disciplinary action against commanding officers who know or should know of
such acts and who fail to take action to prevent and punish them.
• Strengthen oversight and disciplinary bodies by providing strong support for their work, penalizing officers who
do not comply with their directives.
Human Rights Watch also called for international donors to express their concern about police torture to the government
of East Timor; substantially increase support for independent monitoring of police violence and for agencies that can
provide services for victims; and fund and plan for long-term strategies on capacity-building, training, and other
support to the PNTL.
“This report should serve as a wake-up call to the government and donors,” said Adams. “This young country can avoid
emulating its former colonial master, but only if concerted action is taken now.”
After a 1999 referendum on independence from Indonesia, the United Nations took over the administration of the
territory. Indonesia left East Timor impoverished, with few functioning institutions. Establishing a new police force
for East Timor was one of the priorities for the United Nations before sovereignty was passed to the new state in May
2002. Successive U.N. missions in East Timor were instructed and authorized to help enable the rapid development of a
credible, professional and impartial police service.
Recruitment drives for the new East Timorese police service started in early 2000, and basic training commenced on March
27 that year under the auspices of the United Nations Transitional Administration in East Timor. On August 10, 2001, the
East Timor Police Service was officially established alongside U.N. Civilian Police (CivPol), later changing its name to
the Timor-Leste Police Service, before finally adopting its current title of the Polícia Nacional de Timor-Leste (PNTL).
It was not until May 20, 2002, Independence Day, that an agreement was signed outlining the terms and timetable for
CivPol to hand over full policing duties to the PNTL. The handover of policing duties for the final district, Dili, took
place on December 10, 2003, when the PNTL assumed responsibility for general day-to-day policing for the whole country.