East Timorese in Australia still welcomed here: Alatas
East Timorese in Australia still welcomed here: Alatas
JAKARTA (JP): Minister of Foreign Affairs Ali Alatas said yesterday that the door is open to the 700 East Timorese in Australia if they want to return after having their request for political asylum rejected.
"They are all Indonesian citizens anyhow," Alatas told journalists after accompanying UN Secretary Boutros-Boutros Ghali around Merdeka Palace.
Alatas said the government needs to know why the East Timorese applied for asylum. "I think they over-stayed their visa and it's just an immigration problem," he added.
About 700 East Timorese reportedly arrived at different parts of Australia over the past several months and requested political asylum.
But the Australian Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs Senator Nick Bolkus said in Jakarta this week that the East Timorese were turned down because their reasons were unacceptable.
Top Indonesian military officials have hinted that Indonesia should not allow the youths to return on the grounds that the asylum seekers have betrayed their country.
Maj. Gen. Adang Ruchiatna, chief of the Udayana military command overseeing security in East Timor, suggested that the East Timorese try their luck in Portugal.
On Thursday, the Indonesian ministry of foreign affairs issued a statement saying the asylum seekers have "betrayed the trust of two countries."
"Indonesia, which never put any political pressure on them in any way, let them go as tourists and Australia has received them as tourists," the statement read.
Alatas said that the ministry is awaiting a complete report from the Indonesian embassy in Canberra on the asylum bid, including the exact number of the East Timorese.
"The Australian government's rejection of their asylum status is correct because they are not eligible," he said.
Immigration authorities in Bali, where most of the East Timorese departed from, have said that an estimated 98 percent of the 700 asylum seekers' passports were issued by the immigration office in Dili, the capital of East Timor.
Chief of the Bali immigration office H.B. Lapian said that between August and December last year, an average of 200 East Timorese obtained passports every month.
The Australian ministry for immigration and ethnic affairs has announced it will tighten the immigration procedures for East Timorese.
The ministry, as quoted by the Australian embassy in a press statement, said that East Timorese arriving in Australia will now have to specify the purpose of their visit. (pan)