Timor rescue ship ‘grossly overladen’

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33934, 29 August 1975, Page 9

Timor rescue ship ‘grossly overladen’

Z P A Reuter—Copyright

LISBON, August 28.

Several Indonesian warships are still close to Dili, the capital of Portuguese Timor, in spite of the fact that the Governor of the Territory has turned down their offer of help in evacuating refugees from the war-torn colonv.

In a communique describing the situation on the island, the Portuguese Presidency says that the rescue ship Macdiii is steaming for Darwin, in northern Australia, with about 750 people on board, 481 of them Portuguese and the remainder mostly Chinese.

"In the area of the port of Dili there are several Indoesian warships, which did offer to help in the evacuation, but their aid was not considered necessary by the Governor of Timor,” the statement says.

Indonesia is known to be worried about the civil war that broke out some days ago between rival political groups in the Portuguese part of Timor.

When the 500-ton Pan-amanian-registered Macdiii left Dili, the town was under intense mortar bombardment, and the Portuguese Government had chartered another vessel, the Beroona, which is in the Darwin area, to evacuate more people if necessary.

An Australian foreign affairs spokesman, reporting today that the Macdiii was “grossly overladen ” said: “We know from what radio reports we have received that the ship’s deck is so packed with people that the crew cannot move among them, but plans to transfer the wounded and other refugees from the Macdiii to Royal Australian Navy vessels have been abandoned, because it would be too dangerous to attempt a transfer at sea.” Australian immigration

authorities have announced that they will waive normal immigration and quarantine procedures to ensure the speedy transfer of refugees from the Macdiii to hospital and other temporary accommodation.

More than 1100 refugees who were rescued from Dili and landed at Darwin last week-end were forced to wait for 12 hours aboard the 9000-ton Norwegian' freighter Lloyd Bakke before being allowed to land.

The Macdiii is expected off Darwin tomorrow. Two R.A.A.F. Hercules transport aircraft have landed in Darwin, and will transport 180 of the earlier Timorese refugees to Sydney i tonight.

Peace mission An N.Z.P.A. message from Darwin says that Dr Antonio de Almeida Santos, the head of the Portuguese peace mission seeking a cease-fire on East Timor, is due to arrive in Jakarta from London tonight.

Two other members of the peace mission, BrigadierGeneral Enrique Rodriguey and Major Rui Ravara, who flew in a Royal Australian Air Force aircraft to the island of Atauro, off the East Timor capital, today will begin attempts to contact the conflicting Timorese factions.

Another member of the mission, Dr Jose de MelooGouveia, said in Darwin that Dr Santos’s arrival in Jakarta would mark the beginning of a three-pronged diplomatic effort by Portugal, Australia and Indonesia to end the civil war. A fifth member of the mission, Major Jose Carvalho. yesterday travelled to Jakarta, where he established initial links for the

mission with Indonesian, authorities. The members of the mis-’ sion already on Atauro have not yet made contact with leaders ofi either the Timor Democratic Union or the Fretilin forces on the mainland, although the radio link between Atauro to Dili is satisfactory. The United Nations Secre-tary-General (Dr Kurt Waldheim), who has received no response so far to an appeal for a cease-fire in the Portuguese colony of Timor, is said to be in constant touch with representatives of the Australian, Indonesian, and Portuguese Governments.

Angolans rescued N.Z.P.A.-Reuter reports from Windhoek, South-West Africa, that a x South African police rescue team has reached a group of 100 Angolan refugees stranded in a remote Atlantic coast area after crossing the Kunene River into South-West Africa. *

I “Anyone who left Angola by that route must have been really desperate,” a South African police spokesman said. The police have distributed food to the refugees, who crossed the river on a rickety ferry near the Atlantic Ocean. The refugees, escaping from the fighting between nationalist forces in Angola, managed to get about 45 cars and trucks across on the ferry, but these became bogged down in sand. Helicopters are being sent to shift the women and children. The men will attempt to get their vehicles on to hard sand on the .beach and then drive about 370 kilometres to a road leading inland.