Troops, Transitional Rule for E. Timor

The Security Council voted unanimously to authorize the United Nations to take control of East Timor during its transition to independence and to deploy more than 9,000 U.N. peacekeepers there. The U.N. will take over the administration of East Timor, probably for two or three years, to rebuild its shattered infrastructure and set its 800,000 people on the road to democracy before independence from Indonesia is declared. U.N. troops are expected to replace a 15-nation, Australian-led force that the council dispatched to East Timor last month.