| The ark of resistance PHOTO BY DAVID RANSOM has won the Nobel Peace Prize. But he tells David Ransom that he will never be at peace until his country, East Timor, is free. There is nothing abstract about his cause. Of his eleven brothers, four were killed after the invasion of his country, East Timor, by the Indonesian Army in 1975. Ramos Horta has spent the intervening years in exile as the Special Representative of the National Council of Maubere Resistance, the umbrella organization of pro-independence movements inside and outside East Timor. Then, in December 1996 - jointly with the Catholic Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo, who remains inside the country - he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for 'sustained efforts to hinder the oppression of a small people'. 'The Peace Prize has made an enormous difference in awareness-raising around the world,' he says. 'This has resulted in pressure, embarrassment for governments that are now taking the issue much more seriously.' False optimism would not, however, have sustained him through the long years of exile. He has no illusions now. 'The level of repression has increased dramatically,' he continues. 'The number of troops in East Timor is at the same level as in the mid-1970s, when Indonesia first invaded. There are now something like 30,000 troops in the territory. Bishop Belo says he has never seen so many troops. That is not only an arrogant defiance of the world, but also an act of desperation, hoping that they can crush once and for all the people of East Timor... | |
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