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  Issue No 31 Official Organ of LaborNet 17 September 1999  

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News

Asylum Call for Independence Supporters


Independence leaders who have fled East Timor for West Timor and other parts of Indonesia and are now being hunted down have appealed to Australia to provide protection and, where necessary, grant them short-term political asylum.

 
 

The CFMEU's Phil Davey presents $5000 to APHEDA

The plea has come via Australian East Timor support groups to the union aid agency, APHEDA, which says the killing of independence supporters is continuing in West Timor, Bali and other parts of the archipelago.

APHEDA executive officer Phil Hazelton says independence supporters who managed to escape the militias are now in hiding and without adequate travel documents to get out of Indonesia.

"The Australia Government must take steps to protect the people of East Timor and offer safe refuge in Australia until peace is restored. It is obvious there is a 'clean-up campaign' under way right now," he says.

"The whereabouts of one of Fretilin's key negotiators Mr Mahudu and his wife and family are of particular concern. We have heard that after a meeting Kapung with the leadership of the Indonesian military, Mahudu was taken into custody and has not been heard of since.

"The security of the East Timorese leadership must be investigated," he said.

UNAMET has the mandate has the mandate of the intenrational community until November 30. APHEDA is pushing for an extension of this mandate to include the repatriation of more than 150,000 refugees in camps in West Timor - fearing they will be refused access back to East Timor and be dispersed elsewhere in Indonesia.

"One third of the Timorese population has been forcibly taken to West Timor - the UN has a responsibility to these people," Hazelton says..

"No one really knows what has happened in East Timor -we're very fearful of extent of killings and loss of leadership of Independence movement," he says

APHEDA is preparing to assist technical training relief and rebuilding capacity of the East Timorese, including:

- working with nurses association on securing medical supplies (see separate story)

- training for Timorese.

- health and education programs

- running a general appeal - dial 1300 362 223 to make a donation.during business hours or visit theAPHEDA website on http://www.apheda.org.au.

Proof of Atrocities

Below are three websites with photos said to be taken by the Indonesian military. These photos are very graphic and shocking. Don't go there unless you have a strong stomach.

http://www.easttimor.com/html/gal_women.html

http://www.easttimor.com/html/gal_indonmil.html

http://www.angelfire.com/pe/Timor/

Upcoming Events

Every Night - 7.30pm Pax Christi Mass at vigil outside UN office - 43 York St Sydney - contact CFMEU organiser Gary McCarthy 0412 733 486.

Saturday 18th September -11am - Major Rally and march beginning at Hyde Park North immediately following rally - fundraiser for CNRT (National Council for Timorese Resistance) CFMEU building 361 Kent St. Great food, drink, music

* 5.30 pm start for 6pm - special screening of the acclaimed film "Punitive Damage" (about the Dili massacre) at Chauvel Cinema, Paddington Town Hall - All proceeds to Community Aid Abroad's Emergency Fund for East Timor.

* 8pm - Dave Steel fundraiser - Rose, Shamrock & Thistle Hotel, Evans St Rozelle

Monday 20th September * 6.30am Free buses leave CNRT office - 30 Scott St Liverpool for demonstration in Canberra outside Parliament House & Indonesian Embassy. Contact CNRT office 9822 8225.

* 7pm East Timorese Volunteers meeting - Annandale Hotel

Tuesday 21st September * 6pm Amnesty International Vigil - First Fleet Park - Circular Quay

Thursday 30th September* 6pm "Timor Nia Klamas" (Soul of Timor) art exhibition. New GuineaGallery 8th floor Dymocks Building 428 George St City - ph 9232 4737

Volunteers are urgently needed to staff the office at the CFMEU building and distribute leaflets. If you can spare a few hours please give a hand. It would be much appreciated

The support organisation, Australia East Timor Association has suggested the following actions:

- Chinese Consulate 9698 7929 - ring and complain about stalling at Security Council

- Japanese Consulate 9231 3455 - ring and complain about their support for Indonesian Army as peace-keeping force

Consumer Boycotts Spread to North America

Consumer boycotts have for many years been used - very successfully - by the North American union movement as a major industrial weapon .

The Canadian Labour Congress has now turned this weapon onto Indonesia, in support of the East Timorese struggle.

Check out the Canadian Labour Congress Made In Indonesia site. http://www.clc-ctc.ca/campaigns/indo.html

While you are there the CLC helps you to link to company websites so that you can complain to Nike or Crayola crayons to tell them what you think of them operating in Indonesia, using cheap labour and working with a regime which has allowed its military a free hand to slaughter innocents in East Timor.

Canadian and US unions regularly update and distribute lists of products which they ask union members and their families not to purchase while unionists are in dispute.

Because of a long tradition of consumer boycotts they find that generation after generation have happily taken note of this union advice. Employers have been known to beg the union to take their name off the list, because they can see the boycott is effecting their bottom line.

The AFL-CIO and the Canadian Labour Congress have sections in their offices dedicated to researching and regularly updating these consumer boycott lists - and then they go out and actively publicise these lists among members and families.

After the dispute is over the union - or the national union centre - releases an official notice to say it is now AOK to buy that product.


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*    For a full round-up of East Timor support activities visit Free East Timor

*   View entire issue - print all of the articles!

*   Issue 31 contents

In this issue
Features
*  Interview: Sadly Vindicated
Labor�s foreign affairs spokesman Laurie Brereton has spent the past year warning that East Timor would explode without a UN peacekeeping force. Now he�s had to watch his predictions come true.
*
*  International: In the Bunker
One of the last reporters to leave East Timor, Workers Online's HT Lee remembers the week that Dili burned.
*
*  Republic: Tarred With the Same Brush
Neville Wran asks why it is that the most fervant monarchists are also the most eager union-bashers.
*
*  Unions: Hard Labour
Prisoner educators argue more attention needs to be given to rehabilitation through teaching, but they�re facing an uphill battle to convince authorities.
*
*  History: Labour and Community
A history conference in Wollongong next month will look at the changing role for labour into the next century.
*
*  Review: Bobbin' Up - 40 Years On
Forty years after its first publicaton and several European translations Bobbin Up, a classic of industrial fiction, is coming home.
*
*  Satire: East Timor Poll Triumph: Support for Jakarta Up 21 Per Cent
The Indonesian Government has declared that it is pleased with the result of the independence referendum in which 21% of East Timorese voted in support of maintaining links with Indonesia.
*

News
»  Asylum Call for Independence Supporters
*
»  Nurses Collect Vital Medical Supplies
*
»  Industrial Faction for Pre-Conference Caucus
*
»  Lees Backs Freeloader Laws
*
»  Outsourcing Decision - Banks Under the Gun
*
»  Reith Forces Truckies to Speed
*
»  He Talks the Talk - But Can He Walk the Walk?
*
»  Commission Tells AGC to Get Into the Nineties
*
»  Cost-Cutting Puts Clinical Waste in Landfill
*
»  Prisons Reject Free Computers
*
»  US Defence Giant Eyes Welfare Sector
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Columns
»  Guest Report
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»  Sport
*
»  Trades Hall
*
»  Piers Watch
*

Letters to the editor
»  TWU Wrong on Union Bans
*
»  A Lukewarm Republic
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»  Compo Premium Cheats Should be Policed
*
»  Destroying Education
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