President Ramos-Horta: Pope’s visit was ‘incredible’ moment for Timor-Leste

By Joseph Tulloch – Abu Dhabi

On February 4, 2019, Pope Francis and Sheikh Ahmad al-Tayyeb, the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, signed a joint Document on Human Fraternity, condemning religious violence and calling for “the widespread promotion of a culture of tolerance”.

The document was signed in Abu Dhabi during the Pope’s historic visit to the Emirate, the first of its kind.  Since the document’s signing, the UAE has marked the February 4 every year with the awarding of the international Zayed Prize for Human Fraternity.

The event brings together the prizewinners and a number of global political and religious leaders. Among their number this year is José Manuel Ramos-Horta, the President of Timor-Leste.

He spoke to Vatican News about the concept of human fraternity, Pope Francis’ recent visit to his small Southeast Asian country, and the lessons to be learned from its reconciliation with one-time occupier Indonesia.

President Ramos-Horta speaks to Vatican News

Vatican News: Mr President, thank you for your time. In 2022, Timor-Leste became the first country in the world to officially adopt the Abu Dhabi declaration on human fraternity. What is human fraternity, and why is it so important?

President Ramos-Horta: Well, the simple fact that it was crafted by his Holiness Pope Francis together with Grand Imam Tayyeb of Al-Azhar – that in itself should provoke interest and curiosity. Having read it, I have found it to be an exceptional document that very profoundly encapsulates what we all believe in. It has elements that are in the constitution of Timor-Leste, elements that are in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and in so many religious and spiritual teachings.

Particularly given the signatures of His Holiness the Pope and of the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, I thought that this document would be of extreme value for Timor-Leste in continuing the path that we have chosen. We are a small, new country, and we have overcome violence in the past. We pursue reconciliation, not revenge. Our path is one of no anger, no revenge, no violence, healing the wounds of the soul, of the body, and creating a peaceful, inclusive, tolerant society.

So even before I was sworn in for my second term as President, as soon as I was elected, I went to our national Parliament and met with the Speaker. I told him that it was important that our Parliament pass a resolution declaring the Abu Dhabi declaration a national document. He agreed. I visited different party leaders, and they all agreed. And so, even before I was sworn in, the document had been unanimously adopted.

But it should not remain just a document. It should be translated into our languages, and adapted into our school curriculum. So this is what is happening. It’s an ongoing process but work has begun to adapt the document for children of different ages. Then, by the time they’ve reached university age, they will be able to read and understand the full document.

Pope Francis recently visited Timor-Leste. How did that go?

Well, Timor-Leste is 96% Catholic, and devout. On Sundays, churches all over the county – hundreds and hundreds of them, from the cathedral to the humblest chapels in the small, poor villages – are full. So you can imagine the personality, the figure, the myth of the Pope, his tremendous authority.

We estimated that some 700, 000 would come, and we were right. And that is only because we put 700,000 as the maximum! As President, I was worried about our capacity to absorb so many people. How are we going to provide drinking water to the hundreds of thousands of people throughout the day? It was very hot. People were there from early in the morning, some even camped from the day before. And how about sanitation? And security? Not because there was any hostility, but what if there is a stampede? You need only a few people to panic and then it will be chaos.

And yet everything went incredibly well. There were zero incidents of violence, of chaos, of stampedes, but there was the reaction, the emotion of the people. I was there close to His Holiness the Pope, and I was watching the way people were reacting. People were really emotional, crying. People were desperate to touch the Pope’s hands. I brought them to his Holiness the Pope. I saw some children crying – they wanted to see the Pope, and I brought them. And I was, myself, emotional, looking at the way our people reacted. What an extraordinary experience.

President Ramos Horta speaks to Pope Francis during his visit to Timor-Leste

Looking back about four months later, what has the impact of the Pope’s visit been?

Interestingly enough, I had been planning to launch major activities in 2024 to market the country internationally, hiring media specialists and events specialists. Then the Pope confirmed his visit. We knew that at least 100 journalists would accompany him. I personally sent messages, invitations to other journalists, so all together well over 200 journalists came. What I had planned as President to promote our country was no longer necessary! Actually, the Pope’s visit was far, far more effective than any grand plan I had put in place.

So what happened? The visit consolidated the faith of the people, made people feel very proud of being Christian, being Catholic, being Timorese, and made them more attentive to the message of the Pope and the Church. Human fraternity, looking after each other, looking after the children. The Pope always stresses the importance of children. He says to take care of the common people. And then as the Pope was preparing to depart, he told me: “Cuiden bien de este pueblo maravilloso.” [Take good care of this wonderful people]. He was emotional; the Pope was emotional.

What impressed me a lot was his stamina. I was worried, although I didn’t tell anyone, but deep down I was worried about his health. So from day one when we start talking about the Pope’s visit, I said, “The lightest possible program. We cannot tire him.” And yet the program was full. But I looked at the Pope, and he was always smiling. I would have maybe survived one hour, and then I would have said “Enough, enough, I’m going home!”.

That was amazing. His stamina in managing those two full days of visit to Timor-Leste and always remaining in a good mood, always smiling.

You’re here in Abu Dhabi for a Majlis, or council, on human fraternity, and for the awarding of the Zayed Prize. What’s the importance of those two events?

There are so many victims who are children, women, mothers. Look at what has happened in Gaza or Ukraine, in Afghanistan, in Libya, in Myanmar, in the Democratic Republic of Congo right now, in Sudan. The worst humanitarian crisis in the world is actually in Sudan.

We must persevere. We must do our best. One thing that I have shared with Pope Francis is how we must invest more in conflict prevention. We could have prevented October 7 and the events in Gaza. We could have avoided the escalation of tensions between Russia and NATO.

The Pope is the only leader who everybody respects, because other global leaders are all involved in tensions, or in actual conflicts.

President Ramos-Horta speaks to Vatican News

Do you think there’s a lesson for the world in the reconciliation process between Timor-Leste and Indonesia? The Pope talked about it during his visit …

Yes. It boils down to leadership. Leaders are the ones that lead people to wars, leaders are the ones who prevent war, and leaders are the ones who lead people to peace.

In our case, our leader was Mr. Xanana Gusmão, who was a guerrilla fighter, a prisoner. He’s the one who said: we must move on, no revenge, no hatred; we must reconcile first among the Timorese, and then with Indonesia.

Indonesia also showed statemanship, maturity, and rather than rejecting Timor-Leste, because we had rejected them in a referendum, they accepted our hand of friendship. It required leadership from both sides, on our side and the Indonesian side.

If only this could happen elsewhere around the world, between Palestinians and Israelis, in Myanmar, in Afghanistan, in the Democratic Republic of Congo, in Sudan… We need leaders to lead us toward peace.

The above transcript has been lightly edited for reasons for style and brevity.