JAKARTA, Indonesia -- Veteran East Timor resistance fighter Ma Huno has been captured and is undergoing interrogation, a military spokesman in the troubled province said Monday.
Huno had taken over the leadership of East Timor's Fretilin guerrilla following the arrest late last year of the group's leader, Xanana Gusmao.
The 43-year-old Huno was captured Saturday without resistance by Indonesian forces in a rural house with the help of local villagers, Maj. L. Simbolon said. The troops also seized a number of rifles and ammunition, he said.
Huno was being interrogated in East Timor capital of Dili, Simbolon said.
East Timor, 1,250 miles east of Jakarta, was a Portuguese colony for more than 400 years before Lisbon ended its colonial rule there in 1975.
Indonesia annexed East Timor soon afterward and declared the region its 27th province in 1976 in defiance of U.N. resolutions claiming the right of East Timorese to elect their won government.
The United Nations does not recognize Indonesia's soverignty over East Timor following the takeover of the region by Jakarta.
With the capture of Huno -- who is the son of a Portuguese and orginally was named Antonio Gomes Da Costa -- Indonesia marked a major success in its bid to quell the last remnants of the the Fretilin guerrillas.
Huno reportedly was the last major Fretilin leader at large following the capture of top guerrilla leader Xanana in November.
The Fretilin guerrilla movement, which launched an armed rebellion against Jakarta in 1976, is still active in East Timor, although in greatly reduced numbers.
In Lisbon, Portuguese authorities and supporters of Huno said his detention by Indonesian troops would not end unrest in the area.
'The cause of East Timor is on-going,' said Portuguese President Mario Soares. 'When a people is sacrificed and is brutally treated by a cruel dictatorship, the people always win out in the end.'
Portuguese Foreign Minister Jose Durao Barroso said in Luxembourg Monday that Huno's arrest would not make negotiations any easier.
'Things were already difficult, so obviously this arrest will not help. Certainly it will create a less favourable climate for talks,' he said.
