RI must retain East Timor

RI must retain East Timor

Habibie's bungling in the case of East Timor has left the
People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) and Indonesia no other
legitimate way out of the issue than the one explained below.

1. Based on reasoning, once the MPR, thus the Indonesian
nation, has decided that a certain territory is part of Indonesia
and its people are Indonesians, it should stand forever, at least
until the time Indonesia as a state is no longer existing. So an
MPR decree on Indonesia's territory should be considered by the
MPR as irrevocable.

2. Future steps: Now that East Timor has been presented to the
United Nations by Habibie, a person without any right whatsoever
to tinker with MPR decrees, the MPR session to decide on East
Timor should remain steadfast in the ideal that East Timor is an
inseparable part of Indonesia, even though it is accepted that
East Timor as a territory is under temporary UN governance.

Therefore the indigenous people of East Timor can remain
Indonesian, and are free to enter and settle in any other part of
Indonesia if they identify themselves upon entering as such,
otherwise entry should be prohibited.

Another consequence is that Indonesia remains obliged to see
to it that the people of East Timor are treated decently by
whoever is in power there, or at least by protesting to the UN
and the world if they are inhumanly treated. An example was shown
in recent pictures of Australian soldiers handling East Timorese
in a way they would not even handle their own sheep at home or
perhaps like they usually treat their aboriginal citizens.

3. Supporting factors for the above reasoning are, among other
things:

* Kosovo, which is under the UN, remains part of Yugoslavia
(Serbia).

* China remains steadfast that Tibet, Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan,
and the Spratley Islands, and so on, are inseparable parts of
China.

* Chechnya remains part of Russia.

Therefore the stand to be taken by the MPR on East Timor will
indicate whether there are still nationalists in the sense of
nationalists with the 1945 spirit of Indonesia.

JOOP WETIK

Jakarta