EU offers help on E. Timor issues

JAKARTA (JP): A visiting delegation of the European Parliament is offering its good offices to help resolve differences between Indonesia and Portugal over the problem of East Timor.

The delegation of the European Parliament-Indonesia Friendship Association (EPIFA) met with Minister of Foreign Affairs Ali Alatas on Wednesday to discuss the prospect of solving the East Timor issue.

"This issue should be solved. It's only the people that are suffering and we as parliamentarians have the responsibility to do something in order not to continue this struggle which is leading to nothing," EPIFA's vice-president Leonie Van Bladel said after the meeting with Ali in his office.

The 14-member delegation arrived in Indonesia on Aug. 10 and has taken an extensive tour that included East Kalimantan, Maluku, East Nusa Tenggara, East Timor and Bali.

The group is comprised of several European nationalities such as Dutch, German, British and Belgian.

"We have spoken with Alatas about East Timor -- about the past and about the present situation," Bladel said.

Lisbon broke off diplomatic relations to protest Indonesia's 1976 integration of East Timor, which had been a Portuguese colony until 1975.

"We as European Parliamentarians have the intention, with the knowledge we have of all the different parties of the parliament, to bring up the dialog with all Portuguese representatives in those different parties," Bladel said.

The EPIFA delegation met with several cabinet ministers, besides Alatas, such as Minister of Defense and Security Edi Sudradjat and Minister of Forestry Djamaloedin Soeryohadikoesomo.

During their trip to Dili, the delegation met with East Timor governor Abilio Jose Osorio Soares.

Bladel said the delegation sought to inform themselves about the recent developments in order to be more prepared should an issue on Indonesia come up in the European Parliament.

Alatas said on Thursday that he welcomed EPIFA's fact finding visit.

"Hopefully they will get a clear and accurate picture of the development in Indonesia, so they can compare for themselves the conditions in East Timor and the other areas," he said.

On a separate occasion at the foreign ministry building on Thursday, three Dutch citizens, claiming to represent the young Dutch generation, issued a apology for the Netherlands' colonization of Indonesia.

"We apologize for the many missteps of our nation against the Indonesians during the colonization and the colonial war," the statement read. The statement was signed by a pilot called Coenraad Strumphler, an engineer called Ronald Clignet and a physiotherapist named Franny Dethmers. (mds)