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- Newsgroups: misc.activism.progressive
- Path: sparky!uunet!wupost!mont!pencil.cs.missouri.edu!rich
- From: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu (Rich Winkel)
- Subject: INDONESIA: INTIMIDATION STEPPED UP DURING SUMMIT
- Message-ID: <1992Aug31.234146.22617@mont.cs.missouri.edu>
- Followup-To: alt.activism.d
- Originator: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu
- Sender: news@mont.cs.missouri.edu
- Nntp-Posting-Host: pencil.cs.missouri.edu
- Organization: PACH
- Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 23:41:46 GMT
- Approved: map@pencil.cs.missouri.edu
- Lines: 51
-
- /** reg.easttimor: 350.0 **/
- ** Topic: ETAN/Can release on NAM summit **
- ** Written 1:15 pm Aug 30, 1992 by web:etantor in cdp:reg.easttimor **
- East Timor Alert Network/Canada
-
- For immediate release 31 August 1992
-
-
- INTIMIDATION STEPPED UP AS NON-ALIGNED SUMMIT OPENS IN
- INDONESIA
- Human rights groups face increased repression on eve of international
- summit
-
- The government of Indonesia is stepping up repression directed at
- human rights organizations as it prepares for tomorrow's opening of the
- Non-Aligned Movement of states (NAM) summit. Observers believe that the
- government is trying to prevent protests during the triennial gathering of
- Third World leaders.
-
- More than 1,500 soldiers have been moved to Jakarta, the capital of
- Indonesia and site of the summit. Soldiers have surrounded the offices of
- INFIGHT (Indonesian Front for the Defence of Human Rights) and SKEPHI
- (Indonesian NGO Network for Forestry Conservation) and cut phone and fax
- lines into the offices. General Kentot Harsono, military commander in Jakarta,
- has ordered soldiers to shoot without hesitation anyone who joins "protests
- or any other trouble that can send the city into chaos."
-
- A protest by pro-independence youths in Indonesian-occupied East
- Timor last November 12 ended in bloodshed when Indonesian soldiers
- opened fire without provocation on an unarmed crowd, killing over 100
- people.
-
- Military operations have also been stepped up in East Timor, a country
- invaded by Indonesia in 1975. Indonesia has ignored resolutions at the
- United Nations and previous NAM summits calling for it to withdraw its
- troops from East Timor and allow the East Timorese their right to self-
- determination. Indonesia's colonial rule in East Timor has claimed the lives
- of more than one third of the indigenous population, according to Amnesty
- International and other sources.
-
- The East Timor Alert Network calls on the world community,
- particularly leaders of the Non-Aligned Movement states, to ensure that
- human rights (including the right to peaceful protest) are respected during
- the NAM summit and thereafter in Indonesia. ETAN further calls on the
- NAM, which has a proud tradition of anti-colonialism going back to 1955, to
- urge Indonesia to withdraw from East Timor.
-
-
- For more information:
- David Webster (416) 539-9589/531-6154
- ** End of text from cdp:reg.easttimor **
-