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Firm stance promised over rights

Source
South China Morning Post - March 19, 1997

Joe Leahy – East Timor's new bishop has issued a firm warning he will not back down on human rights issues and says he supports some measure of autonomy for the troubled province if it does not lead to civil strife.

Monsignor Basilio do Nascimento made the comments a day before he was due to take up his new post as the bishop of East Timor's newly formed diocese of Baucau.

Accompanied by East Timor's first bishop, Nobel Peace Prize winner Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo, and the Archbishop of Evora in Portugal, Marilio Gouveia, Bishop do Nascimento arrived in Baucau late yesterday afternoon.

Thousands of people gathered along the road between Dili and Baucau to greet the entourage and 15,000 thronged the streets of this small town in the east of Indonesia's annexed province of East Timor.

As the bishop's motorcade entered town, crowds of East Timorese wearing traditional dress played local music and hammered drums, and at a ceremony afterwards a community leader read a greeting to him in the Baucau dialect, Makasai.

Later, the bishop signalled to foreign journalists that he would uphold the Roman Catholic Church's reputation in East Timor as a defender of human rights.

"You know human rights have been a part of Christian life since Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ was a man who respected very much the value of human life and I think each bishop has only to follow His way," Bishop do Nascimento said.

He said human rights should not just be viewed from a political perspective but as a more global truth.

On the long-running issue of whether East Timor should be granted more autonomy, Bishop do Nascimento said that he was not against it as long as the people were ready.

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