Wild celebrations as East Timor PM resigns
DILI, June 26 (Reuters) East Timor's embattled prime minister, Mari Alkatiri, resigned today, saying he would share responsibility for a political crisis that has gripped Asia's newest nation for over two months.
There was no immediate word on a replacement, but news of his departure was welcomed by thousands of people who have been demonstrating in the capital for the past week.
They cheered and beat drums in celebration as word of his resignation spread. A convoy of about 200 buses and vans drove through the seaside capital of Dili, their horns blaring.
Alkatiri said he was stepping down to avoid the resignation of the nation's popular president, Xanana Gusmao, who had threatened to quit himself unless the prime minister left office.
Gusmao said in a statement he had accepted the resignation and had called for a meeting of the State Council, a presidential advisory committee, for Tuesday to discuss the next step.
Alkatiri told a news conference he was quitting ''having deeply reflected on the present situation prevailing in the country ... assuming my own share of responsibility for the crisis affecting our country''.
He said he would remain as a member of parliament, but refused to answer questions.
The prime minister has been widely blamed for violence that erupted in May as fighting within the armed forces spiralled into rioting, arson and looting in Dili.
The violence ended only with the arrival last month of a 2,700-strong Australian-led peacekeeping force that has disarmed the army and police and taken responsibility for security.
Calls for Alkatiri's resignation have been the rallying cry of protests by thousands of Timorese that peaked in the past six days after damaging revelations in an Australian news documentary linked him to a plot to arm a civilian militia.
''The important thing is that the East Timorese fix up these problems themselves and it does look like they are getting to a point of resolution,'' Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said in Paris.
''You can't expect us to carry the burden of security while you yourselves sit back in nothing but a state of impasse,'' he told Australian television.
CONTENDERS One of the country's best-known political figures, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Jose Ramos-Horta is being touted as a possible replacement for Alkatiri should Gusmao ask parliament to form a national unity government to rule until elections due by May 2007.
But Ramos-Horta told reporters: ''I don't want the job but I would do it if persuaded by all relevant parties.
''There are a number of extremely able and competent people within Fretilin who would make a suitable prime minister.'' Neither Ramos-Horta, who himself had resigned as foreign and defence minister on Sunday, nor Gusmao -- both urbane and Western-leaning--belong to the ruling Fretilin party.
The party is seen in the West as socialist-orientated, a legacy of the years its leaders spent in exile in Mozambique or Angola during East Timor's long independence struggle.
Another possible contender for premier is Ana Pessoa, Ramos-Horta's ex-wife, who is a staunch Fretilin member. Labour and Solidarity Minister Arsenio Bano is also a possibility.
Ramos-Horta said it would take time to heal the wounds caused by the violence, and the country should have no shame in seeking foreign help for as long as it took to return to normalcy.
''Sovereignty is beautiful--when you know how to exercise it properly,'' he said, adding that he would be even more vocal in calls for the United Nations to administer elections scheduled for early next year.
Whoever takes over, many Timorese and potential foreign investors want to see more done to rebuild the country's infrastructure and develop projects to create jobs in a country where unemployment is around 70 per cent.
Timor's budget of 415 million dollars is due to be presented to parliament on June 30.
Although Timor's only export is ''boutique'' coffee, the country has potentially vast untapped oil and gas reserves in the sea that divides it from Australia, and has already earned hundreds of millions of dollars in exploration rights.
REUTERS SHR HT1812