East Timor refugees face new threat of violence

A United Nations refugee chief warned today that violence could spill into squalid camps where tens of thousands of East Timorese tried to escape chaos in the capital, as the prime minister blamed former members of pro-Indonesia militias for some attacks.

East Timor’s Nobel laureate and foreign minister, Jose Ramos Horta, took over duties as the tiny nation’s top security minister in a bid to end the unrest that has virtually paralysed the government.