NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #26/NN_1992_26.iso/spool/misc/activism/progress/8277

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From: [e-mail] (Rich Winkel)
Subject: Timor: Stmt to Journalists by Resistance Leader
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/** reg.easttimor: 337.0 **/
** Topic: HORTA'S STATEMENT **
** Written  8:13 pm  Nov  8, 1992 by [e-mail] in cdp:reg.easttimor **
TITLE: Statement by Jose Ramos Horta to Foreign Correspondent's Assn. (long)

Written by FRETILIN Committee NSW in peg:reg.easttimor on 7/11/92

STATEMENT BY MR. JOSE RAMOS HORTA, SPECIAL REPRESENTATIVE OF THE NATIONAL
COUNCIL OF MAUBERE RESISTANCE - C.N.R.M. -* AT THE FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT'S
ASSOCIATION, SYDNEY CLUB

Sydney, 5th November 1992

* The National Council of Maubere Resistance -CNRM- was created in the
mountains of East Timor in 1987 to unite all East Timorese nationalists
organisations that are based inside the country under a non-partisan
leadership organisation. Headed by Mr. Xanana Gusmao as the Leader of
the Resistance, the CNRM comprises the East Timorese National Liberation
Armed Forces (FALINTIL), the Directive Commission of FRETILIN and all
the student and youth organisations.


Mr. President and distinguished members of the Foreign Correspondent's
Association, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemem:

I am grateful to you, Mr. President, for the kind invitation extended
to me to address this gathering of distinguished journalists and guests
on the eve of the first anniversary of the Santa Cruz massacre in Dili
on 12 November 1992.

Almost one year after the horrendous massacre of innocent East Timorese
civilians, womem and children, I am able to state to you without
hesitation and ambiguity the exact extent of the casualties on 12
November 1991.

1. 273 killed, 355 "desappeared" and 376 wounded.

The data I am now sharing with you has been compiled by 12 teams of East
Timorese students, school teachers, priests, nuns, nurses, paramedics,
hospital staff, workers a the morgues, totaling 72 researchers, working
round the clock for three months, interviewing household members in each
"bairro", immediately after the 12 November 1991.

The preliminary report reached Lisbon in February and was handed over to
two specialist groups in Portugal that have been investigating human
rights abuses in East Timor for more than 10 years. A copy was channeled
to Amnesty International for independent verification.

It took six months for mass of the detailed information sent from East
Timor to be processed and analysed. The researchers took extreme care in
double-checking each piece of information.

I can state without hesitation, ladies and gentlemen, that I know the
exact location of several mass graves.  I am prepared to hand over the
information to independent investigators nominated by the UN Secretary-
General.

I challenge the Indonesian authorities to prove I am wrong. And the only
way they might be albe to prove I am wrong is by inviting in an
independent mission of investigation as the one recently appointed to
investigate the killings in South Africa.  The fact is the Indonesian
military regime headed by President Suharto has a far worse record than
any time by the white minority South African regime.

The killings did not stop on 12 November 1991.  In the days and weeks
that followed, more people were killed in Dili and many, many more were
killed in the country.

Ladies and gentlemen, for mnay years you did not believe us.  For too long
you ignored the information we passed on to you.  For years we told you
of massacres  perpetrated by the Indonesian army and you didn't believe
us.  And yet we knew we were telling the truth and because we derive no
satisfaction when we talk about our dead.  I wish, ladies and  gentlemen,
that 12 November 1991 was only a baddream, a nightmare.  I wish that no
one single person had been killed.

2.  Try Sutrisno gave the orders

Gen. Try Sutrisno is the man who directed the killings of 12 November
1991.  I have made this charge twice already, once at the European
Parliament in Brussels on 23 April and the second time to the Council
on Foreign Relations in New York on 14 May 1991.

I am now repeating the charge. Gen. Try Sutrisno, Armed Forces Chief of
the Repulic of Indonesia, issued the ordres to "shoot and kill" to the
Bali regional commander, Gen. Sintong Painjatan, on 10th November, on an
open line telephone converstaion.  The same day, Gen. Try Sutrisno told a
group of Indonesian officers in Jakarta, the "agitators must be dealt a
severe blow like the Chinese did at Tian Nian Men".

Indonesian authorities knew about the plans by East Timorese students to
hold a religious procession and demonstraton to mark the second week of
the death of their fellow student Sebastiao Gomes killed inside the
Motael Church by Indonesian troops.

No effort was made to preempt the demonstration although the security
forces were fully aware of the frantic perparations by the sutdents.
Their plans were in fact an open secret in Dili.  The intention of the
Inodnesian military was to draw out into the open the youth leaders and
"teach them a lesson", in the words of Gen. Try Sutrisno.

The 12 Novmeber 1991  massacre was premeditated murder ordered from the
above. Several Western governments, most notorious being the Australian,
went to great lenghts to excuse the Indonesian government by arguing that
the Dili massacre was the work of local personnel. The 12 November 1991
massacre of 273 East TImorese was ordered from the above, was ordered by
Gen. Try Sutrisno.

I am sending a warning to Gen. Try Sutrisno. We are taking all possible
legal actions to sue him as it happened recently in the US. in the case
of his colleague who carried out his orders, Gen. Painjatan.  He will
have to pay for th crimes he is responsible for. The international
community has not forgotten the Japanese and German officers and their
collaborators responsible for war crimes and is continuing to prosecute
those who escaped justice even almost half a century later.  Gen. Try
Sutrisno and many other members of Indonesian military are guilty of
the Crime of Genocide as defined by the 1949 Geneva Convention on
Genocide and we will spare no effor in seeing them brought to justice.
Their time will come.

3.  PORTUGAL

Portugal colonized East Timor for almost half a millennium.  True, it
neglected its most Eastern colony.  However, ladies and gentlemen, I
strongly reject the charges so often made in this country by Australian
government officials who do not have the courage to denounce Indonesia's
brutal occupation of East Timor and quit4 hypocritically prefer to bully
a small Mediterranean country that has the courage and moral decency to
fight for a small nation.

Australia and other Western countries seem to want that Portugal follow
their own policies of abandonment and betrayal of the East TImorese
and of appeasement and complicity with one of the remaining dinosaurs of
the world. Having colonized East TImor for 500 years, the Portugueses are
now showing moral courage in standing up for the East Timorese.  Shouldn't
they be commended and supported?  Shouldn't we all praise and support
a country, any country, that stands up for human rights and democracy?
Should the world abandon Burma?  SShould the world ignore the war in
Croatia and Bosnia?  Was it wrong for the US., France, the UK. and
little Australia to have intervened in the Gulf to "liberate" Kuwait?

We applaud the Protuguese Minister for Foreign Affairs for his courage
in standing up for human rights in the recent ASEAN-EC Ministerial meeting
in Manila.  It was not only East TImor  that was at stake.  At stake was
the EC own official proclamation of 28 November 1991 linking cooperaton
with human rights and democracy. However, certain Western countries like
the U.K. which invented racism and hypocrisy and Germany (no adjectives
needed), succumbed to their own greed and bullied Portugal.  The Asia
region has the worst human rights record in the world today while
democracy and human rights are well entrenched in the rest of the world.
An alliance of feudal landlords, corrupt military oligarchies and drug
lords, is resisting the winds of change.

4.  War damages compensation

Ladies and gentlemen, few nations have suffered as we in the past 50 years.
In the 40"s, we were invaded and occupied by the Japanese imperial army.
Between 40,000 to 70,000 East Timorese lives were lost.  The country was
thorughly destroyed - schools, hospitals, churches, roads and bridges.
At the end of the world we were forgotten.  No war compensation was ever
paid to the East Timorese. Australia took part in the destruction of our
country.  Yet, Australian govt leaders have the audacity in criticizing
Portugal for not having developed East Timor in 500 years.  Whatever was
built was destroyed by Ausrailan and Japanese forces during WWII.
Whatever was built in East Timor was by the Portuguese alone.  Not one
cent went from Australia or Japan.  Time will come when we will have to
sit down with Australian and Japanese leaders to discuss to long overdue
war damages compensation to the East Timorese.

In spite of the enourmous suffering inflicted upon us by those who call
us their enemy, we remain ready to meet our Indonesian brothrs half-way
to resolve our differences in a peaceful manner.  OUr leader, commander
Xanana Gusmao, has stated time and again the collective and firm desire
of the East Timorese to enter into a process of dialogue with the
Indonesians, under the auspices of the UN Secretary-General, either
directly or as part of a Portuguese delegation or in any other formula
to be worked out by the Secretary-General.

We are now satisfied with the initiatives taken by Dr. Boutros-Boutros Ghali
in promoting the first round of talks between the Portuguese and the
Indonesian Foreign Ministers.  The new Secretary-General took office at
a time of dramatic transformation in the world favoring the strengthening
of the UN system and the office of the Secretary-General.  His own
personal history and credentials lend him considerable moral strength.
He is himself a microcosm of the UN.  The conditions that did not exist
during Javier Perez de Cuellar's mandate are there now.

The Secretary-General is aware that there cannot be "an internationally
acceptable solution" and lasting peace in East Timor without the East
Timorese themselves being consulted on their own fate.  A proces of
consulation cannot be other than a referendum on self-determination
under international supervision.

However, to move towards the final act, the East Timorese are prepared to
be as flexible and creative as possible to consider every possible interim
arragement that is also acceptable to Indonesia. Speaking before the
European Parliament in Brussels in April and the Cuncil on Foreign
Relationsin New York in May I outline a set of ideas which I believe
could contribute towards a comprehensivesettlement of the problem.
These ideas have been formally endorsed by Mr Xanana Gusmao, the
Resistance Leader of EAst Timor in an exclusive interview to the
largest Portuguese weekly NOTICIAS MAGAZINE of 27 September 1992.

5. East Timor's independence is inevitable. Our vision.

East Timor will be independent in this decade.  We have no doubts.
However, before this day, many more thousands will pay with their lives
the price of freedom.

Let me assure eveveryone concerned that an independent EaSt Timor will
endeavour to co-exit with its neighbours through a series treaties
that would bind us together in the economic, security, scientific,
and cultural spheres. In the months preceding our independence will
be busy negotiating our membership in ASEAN, SOuth Pacific Forum and
Asia-Pacific Economic Conference. Through the ACP-EC (Lome Conventions)
we will seek to foster North-South Cooperation.

While we are aware that we are part of this region, we will not betray
500 of our common history with Portugal and throught Portugal we will
seek closer involvement with the European COmmunity.  In a world
increasingly locked in regional pacts and with the Northern
industrialized countries obsessed with Eastern Europe and ex-Soviet
Union, Portugal has been the most loyal advocate of Third World aspirations.
It is abridge between Africa, Latin America and the EC and we intend to
use this bridge for mutual benefit.

With Brazil we will seek ties with the South American countries.  The
Portuguese-speaking African countries that share with us a common history
will take us close to Africa and we will bring them close to Southeast
Asia and the Pacific region in what could well be a model of South-South
cooperation.

East Timor is the cross-road of three culture, civilizations and
religions. Our own Malay-Polynesian and Melanesian ancestry compel us
to our Southeast Asian and South Pacific neighbors.  Centuries of
Portuguese Latin influence make us a  unique bridge between Europe
and the region.  Our deep catholic faith coexisting for centuries
with animism and Islam make us believe in harmony among peoples of
different religions and we would be in a unique situation to promote
racial and religious tolerance.

On day one of independence, we will proclaim a policy of national
reconciliation.  To be true to ourselves, we must forgive our worst
enemies among us.  The Indonesians already living in our land will
be invited to stay on in a different East TImor and to help us rebuild
a common home for all. Properties lawfully acquired will be protected.
East Timorese forced to live overseas who lost their properties will
have to be able to return to the homes they built with so much sacrifice.

Our vision of an independent East Timor is the vision of East Timor and
the seas surrounding it as a Zone of Peace.  East TImor will not have an
army and will not enter into any military arrangement.  For the protection
of its international borders, we will rely on a status of neutrality
to be guaranteed by the UN Security COundil.

On day one of independence , the new government of East Timor will propose
to the Naiotnal Parliament the ratification of all existing international
human rights treaties binding us to full respect for human rights and
democratic rule.

I thank you.


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** End of text from cdp:reg.easttimor **