A civilian police officer with the UN peacekeeping operation in East Timor has been indicted on charges of raping an East Timorese woman and will be put on trial in the capital, Dili.
UN spokesman Mr Fred Eckhard would not give the nationality of the policeman, but other sources confirmed he was a Jordanian, serving with the UN Transitional Administration in East Timor, known as UNTAET.
Mr Eckhard said the policeman was indicted on Tuesday by the East Timor prosecutor-general for the rape, alleged to have taken place in a hotel room. He had been arrested on July 5th and has been imprisoned since then.
The trial is to take place in Dili district court.
In addition to the policeman, the United Nations and the prosecutor-general are investigating allegations of sexual misconduct by Jordanian soldiers in the East Timorese enclave of Oecussi last May. No charges have been filed to date in the probe, ordered by the UNTAET officials in mid-June.
In the case of peacekeepers, all troops are subject to the authority of their respective governments and the United Nations can ask that they be removed from the mission but the same does not apply to civilian police.
Jordanian military and legal experts were cooperating with the United Nations and could observe any possible trial, the officials added.
UNTAET has 7,900 troops, 1,400 police from 40 different nations and about 1,000 civilian staff. It is administering the territory until independence, expected early next year. East Timor, a former Portuguese colony invaded by Indonesia in 1975, voted for independence in August 1999.