From: lms@rle-vlsi.mit.edu (Luis Miguel Silveira)
Subject: Re: about ET:to indonesians (others also welcome)
Reply-To: lms@rle-vlsi.mit.edu
Organization: Research Laboratory of Electronics, Massachusetts Institute of
	Technology
	<1992Nov9.181348.44564@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu>
Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1992 20:58:19 GMT



   In article <1992Nov9.181348.44564@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu>
   hsiahaan@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu writes:

   guys,
   i am getting tired of these (some) people from country that has neglected ET
   for hundreds of years and now come and tell us of what we have,should and 
   must do in ET.

I assume you mean people (like me) from Portugal.  Yes, Portugal
neglected East Timor for many years and may have caused it problems
that will last forever.  That however does not excuse others to do the
same.

   we are doing fine there. indeed there are integration problems
   such as happened last time when some incompetence, irresponsible guardsmen 
   killed ETers. but actions have been taken. the wrongdoers have been
   punished.

At least I can see you do not agree with the version of the guardsmen
being provoked.  Neither do I.  As for you doing fine there, it does
not seem that the East Timorese agree with you.

   we regret this, and we will try not to happen again. but please give us and
   ETers chance to try to integrate. recall it has been just 17 (?) years since
   the integration, which is relatively a short time.

What you call integration others (U.N. included call invasion).

   and local government has been given to local people. fear and suspicion are
   undeniably exist among ETers, but this mainly due to foreign propaganda 
   that makes indonesian government and policy look bad

East Timor has been relatively closed from the outside world since
Indonesia invaded.  The argument that the population has fear and
suspicion because of external propaganda is therefore nonsense.  They
have no access to external media and very little contact with
foreigners.  Do you think tourists alone could change the mentality of
an entire people and make them mistrust the government?  Isn't it more
plausible that are scared because they fear for their lifes under a
government they feel as opressor?  How many people in Timor have
access to this so-called external propaganda?

   so, dont let these people come to us and tell us what to do in ET
   after their country did practically nothing there. they want us to
   leave ET ?

I think the Portuguese statements on the situation have been in order
for Indonesia to let the East Timorese decide their future.  Whatever
that decision will be we can only accept it.  Most of your indonesian
colleagues on this net have expressed faith (that I do not share) that
such a decision would be favorable to integration.  That is one more
reason to determine exactly what the decision would be and once and
for all quiet the critics.

What Portugal and just about every other country in the world (I think
all except Australia) wants is for Indonesia to let the East Timorese
decide for themselves.  The fact that we (Portugal) did nothing there
before is in my opinion irrelevant for their future.  Or in other
words, if I were say swiss or from New Zealand, would you accept my
opinion in any way different?  Why?

   then what would happen to those poor ETers ? would they be able to
   rely on portuguese again ? NOT !

The poor ETers that died as you say as a result of incompetent
guardsment would be alive today, for once.  Other thousands of people
would too.

As for whether East Timor would or should rely on Portugal?  Maybe,
but it would make more sense to rely on Indonesia since it is a larger
and closer country.

The big difference is that this relation would be based on terms that
are acceptable by the East Timorese, not on the terms imposed by the
occupying Indonesians.

   my suggestion: instead of telling us we are wrong, help us find
   ways for faster and smoother integration of ET to indonesia.

What if they do not want to be integrated ?  You want a solution for
the problem which must satisfy all your requirements.  I think there
are more important requirements here, namely the will of the
population.  The first thing to do is ot find out what that will is.
Then we could all work out how to implement it in the best of ways
(this in my opinion would be mostly a task for Indonesia).

You want to find a solution but you do not admit you could be wrong
(or do not want to be told so).  That is too strong a premise because
if you do happen to be wrong, then no solution can ever be found!

Best regards,

-Miguel

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Luis Miguel Silveira                            e-mail : lms@rle-vlsi.mit.edu
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