The British Foreign Secretary, Mr Robin Cook, has announced a London initiative on East Timor and held "very frank" talks with his Indonesian counterpart on Jakarta's much-criticised human rights record.
Mr Cook, who later left Jakarta for the Philippines, is halfway through a whistle-stop tour of four south-east Asian nations during which he has said rights issues will take precedence.
He told reporters after a meeting with the Indonesian Foreign Minister, Mr Ali Alatas, that Britain would propose that EU ambassadors begin visiting East Timor, which they have been refusing to do in protest against Jakarta's 1976 annexation of the former Portuguese colony.
"I can announce today that Britain is proposing to our European partners that there should be a European Union visit at ambassadorial level to East Timor," Mr Cook said at a news conference. " would enable Europe to be more fully informed of the situation in East Timor and of the views of its people," he said.
Mr Alatas, who said talks with Mr Cook were frank but calmly conducted, welcomed the move, adding that Indonesia had always regarded the European policy as incomprehensible since deputy ambassadors regularly visited the territory.
"We thought it was a rather strange policy but we didn't make much out of it. Now that the proposal comes from Britain for the ambassadors to visit East Timor, of course they can go. We have always told them they are free to go as many [other] ambassadors are going," he said.
Mr Alatas also criticised Portugal for its unwillingness to compromise in UN-sponsored talks over the future of East Timor. (On Monday Indonesia rejected a compromise of autonomy for East Timor within the Indonesian state proposed by an East Timorese guerrilla leader, Mr Konis Santana.)
Mr Alatas cautioned Britain against linking future arms exports to human rights conditions, saying if this were to happen Jakarta would buy its weapons elsewhere. Britain is by far Indonesia's largest armourer.
In Lisbon, the Nobel Peace Prize winner and expatriate Timorese resistance leader, Dr Jose Ramos-Horta, said the EU ambassadorial initiative was "very important" for the territory.
Mr Cook said he made it clear that the international community would continue to criticise Indonesia until it had improved its record. "We held very frank talks," he said.
"Indonesia is a signatory to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. We are not asking Indonesia to accept any eccentric Western standards of human rights," he said. "We want to work to achieve observation of a treaty to which we are both signatories."
Indonesia denies it has a major human rights problem. Activists insist Indonesian forces have been using British weapons to crush internal dissent and Mr Cook said he had explained new stricter criteria on British arms exports.
Mr Cook offered a six-point British aid package, including material support to the National Human Rights Commission, which although set up by the state has criticised what it considers to be abuses. Similar help would be given to the Legal Aid Foundation, which advises poor defendants, and the UK would offer 20 scholarships in Britain for the study of good government. British police would also give a series of lectures to Indonesian law enforcement officers on dealing with public order problems.
"In general the efforts to have concrete co-operation in the relationship between two countries, especially in the area of human rights, will always be welcomed," Mr Alatas said.
"In the field of human rights, let us not lecture each other or accuse each other," he said, adding that Mr Cook had not hectored him.