60,000 protest against pro-Indon.ET Govenor

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Subject: LUSA: 60,000 protest against pro-Indon.ET Govenor
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1998 08:07:32 -0400 (EDT)
From: "Sharon R.A. Scharfe" <pet@web.net>

12 OUT 98 - 12:32 East Timor/Macau: Over 60,000 demonstrate against Pro-Indonesian Governor

Macau, Oct. 12 (Lusa) -
More than 60,000 people participated in Dili on Monday in a protest rally against pro-Indonesian Governor Abilio Osorio Soares' decision to fire all civil servants failing to support Jakarta's autonomy proposal for the occupied territory. João Alves, a member of the National Political Commission of the Timorese National Resistance Council, told LUSA in Macau by telephone in Dili the demonstrators had first assembled at the former ''Academica'' stadium before converging on the centre of the capital in a convoy of private cars. Alves told LUSA the convoy comprised ''hundreds'' of cars from various cities in East Timor.

The demonstration coincided with the visit to East Timor of a group of military attaches accredited to Jakarta. The protest rally was expected to end on 2 pm local time in East Timor, following a general strike in Dili on Sunday.

Alves described the governor's decision to dismiss all public servants failing to support, in writing, Jakarta's autonomy proposal for the occupied territory as ''proper to a dictatorship.'' Alves also told LUSA that the Indonesian Armed Forces had presently nine fully equipped battalions in East Timor, including tanks, namely in the eastern part of the occupied territory. Alves also said that armed combat involving seven FALINTIL freedom fighters and 30 soldiers of the Indonesian battalion No. 646 in the region of Manatuto in central East Timor last Saturday had reportedly resulted in several casualties.

Alves urged the European Union, the Community of Portuguese-speaking Countries and the United Nations to come out against the Indonesian Armed Forces (ABRI) continued military operations in East Timor. Alves also appealed to the Portuguese government as East Timor's legitimate administering power and the United Nations to take stand on the threat by pro-Indonesian Governor Osorio Soares to dismiss all civil servants failing to support Jakarta's autonomy proposal for the occupied territory.-Lusa nnnn

For more information on Parliamentarians for East Timor, Please Contact: Sharon Scharfe, International Secretariat, PARLIAMENTARIANS FOR EAST TIMOR Suite 116, 5929-L Jeanne D'Arc Blvd., Orleans, ON K1C 7K2 CANADA Fax: 1-613-834-2021 E-Mail: pet@web.net

"... where there are profits to be defended, law, justice, freedom, democracy and peace are the victims." -- Xanana Gusmao, Jailed Leader of East Timor in Preface to "Complicity: Human Rights and Canadian Foreign Policy -- the Case of East Timor" (Montreal: Black Rose Books, 1996)

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