Bishop Belo and Ramos-Horta Share 1996 Nobel Peace Prize Bishop Carlos Belo and Jose Ramos-Horta shared the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize, the Norwegian Nobel Committee said Friday. They shared the prize "for their work toward a just and peaceful solution to the conflict in East Timor," Committee Chairman Francis Sejersted said. Sejersted said the committee had tried in vain to telephone Belo and Ramos-Horta to tell them they had won the prestigious prize. "Belo...has been the foremost representative of the people of East Timor. At the risk of his own life, he has tried to protect his people from infringements by those in power," the committee said in a statement. Belo, East Timor's outspoken, and often fiery Roman Catholic bishop, is long used to walking a tightrope between his flock and the government. The committee said Ramos-Horta "has been the leading international spokesman for East Timor's cause since 1975 when Indonesia took control of East Timor."
Nobel Acceptance Speeches: Ramos-Horta; Bishop Belo The 1996 Nobel Peace Prize for Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo and Jose Ramos Horta by Irwin Abrams (1997) PBS
Online Forum Nobel Peace Prize Winner Jose Ramos-Horta answers questions
(October 25, 1996) In A Time for Justice (a London speech given in July 1997) Bishop Belo says, "Our small nation of East Timor has suffered an invasion and occupation by military forces largely supplied with their armaments by Western countries such as the United States, and the United Kingdom." Numerous recent statements by Bishop Belo and Jose Ramos-Horta can be found in Selected Postings, as well as letters and other statement by Bishop Belo in the Religious section. The full text of Jose Ramos Horta's 13 December, 1998 Human Rights Oration Human Rights and Morality vs Pragmatism and Real Politik, is on the East Timor Relief Association website. A powerful and wide-ranging speech, it provides a very useful update on how the East Timorese leadership sees things at the end of this eventful year.
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