Lisbon – Portugal will continue to support the reconstruction East Timor, "particularly in the areas of education and the promulgation of the Portuguese language", a senior Lisbon official said Friday.

Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs and Communities Antonio dos Santos was speaking after a meeting at the Lisbon Foreign Ministry with Francisco Guterres, speaker of the Dili parliament, who is visiting Portugal for his first time since his country's independence in May.

Dos Santos announced that the new Portuguese School in Dili will be inaugurated on December 4. Guterres had called Thursday for the boosting of efforts to teach Portuguese, one of Timor's two official languages, along with Tetum. The majority of the Dili parliament's lawmakers have difficulties using Portuguese, Guterres had said.