MPs sign Timorese support declaration

MORE THAN 400 parliamentarians from 13 countries, including Britain, Portugal, Australia and Japan, have given their support to a declaration supporting the right of the people of East Timor to be represented at talks now being held under 'UN auspices between Portugal and Indonesia.
The declaration, presented in London on Monday by Liberal peer, Lord Avebury, is timed to coincide with a meeting in Amsterdam this week of the Inter-Governmental Group on Indonesia, through which millions of dollars of western investment are channelled into Indonesia. Since 1975 the Indonesian army has occupied the former Portuguese colony of East Timor, 400 miles north of Australia, in defiance of a UN ruling. Recent reports suggest
that one sixth of the predominantly Catholic Timorese people have been wiped out as the Indonesian army struggles for control of East Timor with local guerrillas.
The parliamentarians affirm in their declaration that there will be no "just settlement" in East Timor until representatives of the people are included in negotiations about their fugure, negotiations which must "include an act of selfdetermination, which is free from interference and verified by international observers acceptable to the East Timorese people".
Among those who signed the declaration in this country were Catholic MPs David Alton, Denis Canavan, Kevin McNamara, Robert Parry and Sir Hugh Rossi.