Five East Timorese depart for Portugal
Five East Timorese depart for Portugal
JAKARTA (JP): As five asylum-seeking East Timorese left the New Zealand embassy here for Portugal yesterday, three East Timorese freedom fighters spent their first day home after living in exile for three-and-a-half decades.
The five youths left the New Zealand embassy accompanied by officials from the International Committee for the Red Cross in the evening and were taken straight to Soekarno-Hatta airport to board a KLM flight to Lisbon via Amsterdam.
They had entered the embassy on Friday seeking asylum in New Zealand. However, like previous asylum seekers, they settled for Portugal instead.
Their departure raised the number of East Timorese who have sought asylum to Portugal in the past five months to 50.
Indonesian officials have put down these attempts as attention grabbing ploys and denied the youths' claim of military persecution against them.
This latest incident comes on the eve of the seventh trilateral talks between Indonesian Minister of Foreign Affairs Ali Alatas and his Portuguese counterpart Jaime Gama in London.
Under the aegis of the United Nations Secretary General, the talks will attempt to find an internationally acceptable solution to the East Timor issue.
East Timor was integrated as part of Indonesia in 1976. However, the UN still recognizes Lisbon as the administrative power there.
Meanwhile in Dili, returning freedom fighter Evaristo da Costa, 60, said those who have sought asylum to Portugal under the illusion of leaving for a better life will soon regret their actions.
"It is a mere dream," he said yesterday.
He said that, once in Portugal, they will be nothing more than second class citizens living in poverty.
Evaristo and two others, Armando Amaral, 56, and Domingos Soares, 56, arrived in Dili on Sunday after living in exile since 1959.
The three took part in a revolt against the Portuguese colonial administration demanding East Timor's integration into Indonesia.
The uprising was brutally crushed within a week and cost some 500 people their lives. Sixty-eight of those involved were exiled by the colonial authorities to Angola, Mozambique and Portugal.
After being formally released in Lisbon in 1974, the three attempted to return home. However, their efforts were blocked by the Portuguese government.
Evaristo called on East Timorese youths not to be swayed by those who persuade them to leave the country for a better life. He also advised against believing the stories being cooked up abroad against Indonesia.
"If the Dili incident is judged as a human rights abuse, then compare it with the Portuguese human rights abuse against the East Timorese people for nearly 500 years," Evaristo remarked. He was referring to events of Nov. 12, 1991 when according to government estimates at least 50 demonstrators were killed during a clash between demonstrators and security forces, according to government figures.
Evaristo also expressed his amazement at the rapid development achieved by Indonesia's 27th and youngest province in just 30-odd years.
"It's difficult for me to believe that Dili, which was once so quiet, with such limited infrastructure during the Portuguese colonial era, is now bustling with tremendous infrastructure development," he told Antara after meeting with Governor Abilio Soares.
The government has said it will give the three freedom fighters a house and a piece of land.(mds)