[asia-apec 199] MPFA News Release

[alarm]

NEWS RELEASE (10/25/96)
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Organizers of the Manila People's Forum on APEC said they would still 
seek to reverse the ban on the entry of Jose Ramos Horta in time for 
their parallel conference to the official APEC Summit in Manila. This, 
despite the statement from President Ramos that the Nobel laureate would 
be welcome to the Philippines after the November APEC meeting.

"Mr. Ramos-Horta made it clear in his last teleconference that the 
Manila People's Forum is a unique opportunity for him, as it gathers 
people's movements and NGOs from across the Asia-Pacific to discuss 
regional issues," said MPFA Coordinator Omi Royandoyan. "He would very 
much want to present his proposals for peace in East Timor and his 
perspectives on regional issues to this wide-ranging audience, just as 
the other delegates to the forum are eager to hear from him. We thus 
cannot simply give up in our campaign to have Mr. Ramos-Horta here with 
us in Manila come November."

The MPFA added that they found it "difficult to understand why the 
simple and peaceable exercise of the right to free expression, on a 
matter that could potentially benefit not just Indonesia and East Timor 
but the entire Asia-Pacific region, could be construed as injurious to 
the national interest."

Several Philippine and international groups have expressed support to 
the bid to reverse the Philippine government's ban on the 1996 Nobel 
Peace Prize winner. Among them are the influential Catholic Bishops 
Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), Forum Asia, and Human Rights Watch 
Asia, a Washington DC-based monitoring and lobby group.

The MPFA said it would continue with its international and Philippine 
campaign to gather support for Ramos-Horta's entry into the Philippines, 
including a bid to make APEC heads of state boycott the official summit 
should Horta be denied entry. The organizers added that they would file 
a legal case questioning the basis of the ban; and seek the intervention 
of Philippine courts to allow Ramos-Horta into the country.