Asia Times: Formerly icy SE Asia warms to East Timor



	February 11, 2000	atimes.com

Southeast Asia

Formerly icy SE Asia warms to East Timor
By Anil Netto

PENANG, Malaysia - East Timor's independence leaders Xanana Gusmao and Jose Ramos-Horta have wrapped up an Asian tour with fresh promises of help from Southeast Asian governments keen to make up for their decades-long coolness to the territory's cause.

In fact, at just about every stop in the region there has been discussion about East Timor being linked in some way to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean). Some want East Timor to observe this July's meeting of Asean ministers and eventually become a member of the 10-country group.

Gusmao and Ramos-Horta's 40-minute encounter with Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad in Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday was closely watched to see if the once icy relations with Malaysia had thawed. Mahathir had accused the West of inciting the East Timorese and had said the territory would have been better off if it had remained a part of Indonesia. He had also said Indonesia had done a lot to develop East Timor, which Jakarta annexed as a province in 1976 and whose occupation bred a simmering rebellion until a UN-supervised vote in August 1999 led to independence.

''We look at the matter as over with,'' said Foreign Minister Syed Hamid Albar of Kuala Lumpur's lack of sympathy for East Timor's cause. ''We want to forge ahead to regional and bilateral relations and we believe the East Timor government will be in place within two or three years.''

Gusmao, president of the National Council for Timorese Resistance, requested Malaysia's support for East Timor to be granted full observer status at Asean meetings. ''They are keen to get first-hand knowledge of Asean's workings, since it has been a successful regional grouping,'' said Syed Hamid.

But Syed Hamid said that did not mean East Timor would automatically join Asean later. The issue, he added, would only be raised when the new nation's transitional period under United Nations administration was over. ''Maybe, after two or three years under the UN Transitional Authority in East Timor, the idea can be raised formally,'' he said.

Veteran Malaysian opposition politician Lim Kit Siang said the East Timor independence leaders' visit to the region should be an occasion for Asean governments to work out a ''coordinated program'' to help rebuild East Timor. ''Malaysia should propose at the fourth Asean Finance Ministers' Meeting in Brunei on March 25-26 the setting up of an Asean special commission to assist in the rebuilding of East Timor,'' he said. Each Asean government, added Lim, should be committed to a budgetary allocation for the commission.

''Asean nations should play a more active part to assist the East Timorese in their critical transition toward nationhood as well as development,'' said Lim. He also called on Asean members to play a more prominent role in the United Nations peacekeeping force in East Timor. Lim said the first Asean-UN summit in Bangkok on February 12 would be the ideal occasion for the announcement of an Asean initiative in East Timor to promote peace, development and justice.

Gusmao and Ramos-Horta's visit to Kuala Lumpur was the last leg of an 18-day six-nation Asian tour, which began on January 23. The warmth they encountered is far removed from the bitter days when Asean governments vehemently refused to offend Indonesia by criticizing human rights violations in East Timor or discussing independence.

Four years ago, an Asia-Pacific Coalition for East Timor II (APCET II) conference in Kuala Lumpur was broken up by an unruly mob linked to Malaysia's ruling coalition. Authorities detained 59 participants and journalists covering the international conference for up to six days, while another 40 foreign delegates were deported.

But, on the fringes of this week's visit to Malaysia by Gusmao and Ramos-Horta, the process of soul-searching about attitudes toward East Timor has begun.

At a public forum on Tuesday night, attended by Gusmao and Ramos-Horta, a former leader of the youth wing of the dominant United Malays National Organization, Saifuddin Nasution, admitted he organized the mob at the APCET conference after allegedly being instructed to do so by a government deputy minister with the blessing of the national leadership.

The angry mob had broken down the doors to the conference hall at a local hotel, and then verbally and physically abused the delegates. '''With deep regret, I am here to offer my apology to all of you,'' Saifuddin, who is now an opposition politician, told the audience of 500.

The Philippine government previously also clamped down on a similar meeting and had subsequently denied an entry visa to Ramos-Horta when he was invited to speak at a local university.

''The Asian tour has been a great success in terms of the reception from the governments and the people of the region,'' says Elizabeth Wong, a steering committee member of APCET, an umbrella group for East Timor solidarity groups in the region. ''From what we gather, it appears that Asean is very keen to have East Timor as part of the Asean family. East Timor leaders have had some reservations because of the past. But Asean itself is changing.''

(Inter Press Service)

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