RI reject Lisbon's accusation about asylum seekers
RI reject Lisbon's accusation about asylum seekers
JAKARTA (JP): Indonesia has accused Portugal of exploiting the issue of East Timorese youths flocking to foreign embassies to request political asylum for its own political advantage.
Spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Ghaffar Fadyl, in the latest round of trading accusations with Portugal, said Lisbon has been hurling false accusations at Indonesia.
Lisbon's statement that Indonesia had sought to use the flight of asylum-seekers from East Timor as a political safety valve was "groundless", Fadyl said.
He also said yesterday that Indonesia has never exerted any pressure on East Timorese to flee the province.
Besides, he said, those who left represented only a small number of East Timorese people.
Reuters reported on Monday Portugal's Prime Minister Antonio Guterres as accusing Indonesia of creating the conditions "for a generalized exit of Timorese with the object of easing internal pressures".
"That's baseless. There is no tension in East Timor. It's Portugal which continues to exploit the situation in East Timor for their own advantage," Ghaffar said here yesterday.
Meanwhile, the four East Timorese youths who climbed the fence into the French Embassy to seek asylum left for Portugal last night under the auspices of the Jakarta office of the International Commission of the Red Cross.
It was the second penetration of the French Embassy by a group of East Timorese asylum seekers in less than a week and the fifth sanctuary bid at Jakarta embassies in two months.
Henri Fournier of the International Commission of the Red Cross told The Jakarta Post the four left for Lisbon on a flight via Amsterdam, the same route taken by five East Timorese who sought sanctuary in the French Embassy last week.
The French Embassy declined to comment on the asylum bid.
Fournier said the International Commission of the Red Cross was merely helping the Indonesian and French governments to solve the problem by facilitating the departure of the asylum seekers to the country they wished to enter.
Foreign missions in Jakarta have boosted security to deter East Timorese asylum seekers.
Meanwhile, the district court in Maliana, East Timor, sought a five-year jail sentence for Sanusi Abubakar, accused of sparking recent religious tension in the province with statements which denigrated the local Roman Catholic community.
The prosecutor, who presented on Monday eight witnesses at a trial session in Maliana district court presided over by Judge Sinansius Misnan, said Sanusi had violated Chapter 156 of the Criminal Code on blasphemy.
The trial session was adjourned until tomorrow to hear the defendant's response.(rms/yac)