Subject: AFP: Lisbon asks Albright to raise East
Timor question with Jakarta
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1998 10:18:11 -0500
From: "John M. Miller" <fbp@igc.apc.org>Portugal-ETimor-US Lisbon asks
Albright to raise East Timor question with Jakarta
LISBON, Nov 17 (AFP) - Portuguese Foreign Minister Jaime Gama has asked US Secretary of
State Madeleine Albright to raise the question of East Timor with the Indonesian
authorities when she visits Jakarta this week.
A foreign ministry spokesman said Gama had written to Albright complaining that
Indonesia had increased its military presence in East Timor in violation of undertakings
given by its foreign minister Ali Alatas.
The spokesman, quoted by the Portuguese news agency Lusa, said Alatas had made the
pledge during the last round of UN-mediated talks on East Timor in New York in August.
Gama also drew Albright's attention to recent allegations by a former governor of East
Timor that Indonesian troops massacred some 150 East Timorese in 1991, only days after the
already-known killings at the Santa Cruz cemetery in Dili, the territory's capital, on
November 12.
Gama said the revelations to a Lisbon weekly, Expresso, by Mario Carrascalao confirmed
assertions by Dili's bishop and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Carlos Ximenes Belo, that the
number of victims of the Santa Cruz massacre was much higher than the 30 dead admitted by
Jakarta.
The United Nations considers Portugal to be still the administrative power in East
Timor, which was occupied by Indonesia in 1975 and annexed the following year.
Back to November Menu
Back to Main Postings Menu & Site Search Engine |
