Australia, UK hushed up killing 5 journalists
Sidney Morning Herald
November 30, 2005 - The Australian and British governments colluded to cover up the killing of five Australian-based journalists in East Timor in 1975, new documents reveal.
Five television journalists - Greg Shackleton, Gary Cunningham and Tony Stewart of the Seven Network, and Malcolm Rennie and Brian Peters of the Nine Network - were killed while covering Indonesia's invasion of East Timor.
Official reports say the men, known as the Balibo Five, were killed in crossfire, but an inquest in Australia next year will examine the long-held theory that they were murdered by Indonesian forces.
British Foreign Office documents, including communiques from Jakarta to Downing Street, have been obtained by relatives of those killed and have been published in The Times in London.
They openly discuss collusion with the Australian government to cover up the true story behind their deaths.
"We have suggested to the Australians that, since we in fact know what happened to the newsmen, it is pointless to go on demanding information from the Indonesians which they cannot or are unwilling to provide," then British ambassador Sir John Ford said.
"Since no protests will produce the journalists' bodies, I think we should ourselves avoid representations about them.
"They were in the war zone of their own choice."
By the time East Timor regained independence in 1999, an estimated 200,000 people had been killed during the Indonesian occupation.
The British government communiques showed a deliberate policy to play down Indonesian atrocities while chairing the United Nations Security Council.
"Timor was high on (US Secretary of State) Henry Kissinger's list of places where the US do not want to comment or get involved," Ford wrote in a communique in late 1975.
"I am sure we should continue to follow the American example.
"Once the Indonesians had established themselves in Dili, they went on a rampage of looting and killing.
"If asked to comment on any stories of atrocities I suggest we say that we have no information."
The families of the Balibo Five are pushing to have more Foreign Office documents released for the Australian inquiry.
Liberal Democrat MP Don Foster will table parliamentary questions next week to try to discover the extent of British government knowledge of the fate of the Balibo Five.
"There is clear evidence that the British government was complicit in a cover-up of the facts of the death of British journalists," Foster said.
[andend] - original story at - Ur.: http://tinyurl.com/7vf3t
Related: (Pls. scroll) - Political murder journalist/activist Louis Sévèke - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/b4vw7
FOREIGN PRESS FOUNDATION / Journalism - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/7w8eo
http://forpressfound.blogspot.com/
Editor: Henk Ruyssenaars
http://tinyurl.com/amn3q
The Netherlands
FPF@Chello.nl*
FPF-COPYRIGHT NOTICE - In accordance with Title 17 U. S. C. Section 107 - any copyrighted work in this message is distributed by the Foreign Press Foundation under fair use, without profit or payment, to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the information. Url.: http://liimirror.warwick.ac.uk/uscode/17/107.html
-0-
November 30, 2005 - The Australian and British governments colluded to cover up the killing of five Australian-based journalists in East Timor in 1975, new documents reveal.
Five television journalists - Greg Shackleton, Gary Cunningham and Tony Stewart of the Seven Network, and Malcolm Rennie and Brian Peters of the Nine Network - were killed while covering Indonesia's invasion of East Timor.
Official reports say the men, known as the Balibo Five, were killed in crossfire, but an inquest in Australia next year will examine the long-held theory that they were murdered by Indonesian forces.
British Foreign Office documents, including communiques from Jakarta to Downing Street, have been obtained by relatives of those killed and have been published in The Times in London.
They openly discuss collusion with the Australian government to cover up the true story behind their deaths.
"We have suggested to the Australians that, since we in fact know what happened to the newsmen, it is pointless to go on demanding information from the Indonesians which they cannot or are unwilling to provide," then British ambassador Sir John Ford said.
"Since no protests will produce the journalists' bodies, I think we should ourselves avoid representations about them.
"They were in the war zone of their own choice."
By the time East Timor regained independence in 1999, an estimated 200,000 people had been killed during the Indonesian occupation.
The British government communiques showed a deliberate policy to play down Indonesian atrocities while chairing the United Nations Security Council.
"Timor was high on (US Secretary of State) Henry Kissinger's list of places where the US do not want to comment or get involved," Ford wrote in a communique in late 1975.
"I am sure we should continue to follow the American example.
"Once the Indonesians had established themselves in Dili, they went on a rampage of looting and killing.
"If asked to comment on any stories of atrocities I suggest we say that we have no information."
The families of the Balibo Five are pushing to have more Foreign Office documents released for the Australian inquiry.
Liberal Democrat MP Don Foster will table parliamentary questions next week to try to discover the extent of British government knowledge of the fate of the Balibo Five.
"There is clear evidence that the British government was complicit in a cover-up of the facts of the death of British journalists," Foster said.
[andend] - original story at - Ur.: http://tinyurl.com/7vf3t
Related: (Pls. scroll) - Political murder journalist/activist Louis Sévèke - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/b4vw7
FOREIGN PRESS FOUNDATION / Journalism - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/7w8eo
http://forpressfound.blogspot.com/
Editor: Henk Ruyssenaars
http://tinyurl.com/amn3q
The Netherlands
FPF@Chello.nl*
FPF-COPYRIGHT NOTICE - In accordance with Title 17 U. S. C. Section 107 - any copyrighted work in this message is distributed by the Foreign Press Foundation under fair use, without profit or payment, to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the information. Url.: http://liimirror.warwick.ac.uk/uscode/17/107.html
-0-
posted by Forpressfound at 11:00 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home