Angelita Pires, assessora juridica ba Alfredo Reinado presa horiseik!

Angelita Pires iha ligasaun ho Partido Democratico.
Angelita Pires nia primos rasik maka Emilia Pires, Ministra das
Financas, ho Alfredo Pires, Secretario de Estado dos Recursos
Naturais.

Ohin nia hettan liberdade condicional...

Australian accused on Timor attacks
SMH.com.au

Lindsay Murdoch in Dili and Jill Jolliffe in Darwin
February 19, 2008

AN Australian woman wept in a Dili court last night as she appeared in
connection with the attacks on East Timor's two top political leaders
in what prosecutors called a breakthrough in the investigation.

Angelita Pires, a well connected Timorese-born Australian, is the
first person to appear in court over the gun attacks during which the
country's popular President, Jose Ramos-Horta, was seriously wounded.
Pires, in her late 30s, had been due to fly to Darwin, where she grew
up, last night.

Her mother, Maria Pires, told the Herald at her Darwin home: "Our
family fought hard for independence. It seems so unjust my daughter
might be sent to prison."

Pires, a confidante of the rebel leader killed in the gun raids,
Alfredo Reinado, was allowed to go home after her four-hour closed
court appearance in Dili. A prosecutor said it was the first of a
number of hearings. He said the judge had not made any decision as to
her guilt or innocence.

Her sister Lourdes, who was in court, called a friend to say that
Pires was "free for now".

Pires had been detained and questioned in relation to the attempted
murders of Mr Ramos-Horta and the Prime Minister, Xanana Gusmao, in
relation to the February 11 gun attacks. She was also detained in
connection with possible conspiracy for crimes against the state, East
Timor's Prosecutor-General, Longuinhos Monteiro, told the Herald.

In court, Pires - who is known as Angie - broke down and wept under
questioning. She was comforted by her sister. Pires left the court by
a back entrance and was taken away in a four-wheel-drive, sitting on
the floor and covering her face to shield herself from the media.
Pires, who was represented by a public lawyer, told her family she
would like to explain her position to the media, but not until she
could arrange her own lawyer.

In the days following the attacks Pires told friends she had
information that Reinado was lured to Mr Ramos-Horta's house to be
assassinated because he was about to reveal plots by powerful
political figures.

But United Nations investigators are pursing evidence indicating that
Reinado went to the house intending to kidnap Mr Ramos-Horta. Pires
spent months in East Timor's mountains with Reinado before the
attacks. She was present during negotiations to try to convince him
and his men to surrender.

"Angela was one of the closest people to Alfredo," a reliable
government source said.

A lawyer for Reinado has said he saw Pires in Reinado's camp. "I saw
Angelita Pires there sometimes," said Benny Benevides, who frequently
visited the camp to consult his client.

"But I never saw her handle guns, and she was always in civilian
clothes. She was said to be a legal adviser."

Reinado was shot dead when he and 11 masked gunmen stormed Mr
Ramos-Horta's home.

Mr Monteiro, who had earlier identified Pires only as "AP", said she
allegedly knew about the attacks before they happened "but did not
tell the state". He said she was detained and questioned with seven
other people after raids in Dili at the weekend. The others have been
released.

Pires declined a request to be interviewed by the Herald last week as
she helped Reinado's family organise his funeral in Dili.

But her mother, Maria, 68, agreed to talk to the Herald last night on
condition that the conversation was restricted to her daughter's
childhood. She recalled sheltering her seven small children from
bombardment in the mountain town of Maubisse during the 1975 civil
war.

"They were so scared," Mrs Pires said. "I would put a blanket over us,
and say: 'Hold each other, we're going to pray very hard,' and we'd
get through it."

Angie Pires was nine then, and a few months later was evacuated to
Darwin to begin life as a refugee.

In her simple weatherboard home in Darwin's northern suburbs, Maria
Pires remembered the moment. "We travelled in a small plane overloaded
with people. I had my seven, plus two other children. There was
fighting going on in Dili and we were terrified someone would take a
shot at us as we took off."

Pires's late father, Laurentino Pires, was a former Portuguese-era
administrator who notoriously was involved in the hijacking of an
Australian military plane from the Timorese town of Baucau in 1975. He
and a small group of Timorese men were arrested when the plane landed
in Darwin.

The family, arriving with nothing, soon became respected for their
outspoken stand against Indonesia's military occupation of East Timor,
and the women were known as being strong.

"Angie was just a normal girl, except that she was very smart at
school," Maria Pires said. "She could have gone to university, but
there was no money."

Pires instead worked at Coles after high school and later at Darwin
Casino, where she was trained as a croupier. After some time there she
moved to Brisbane to work for Jupiters Casino.

After Indonesia's withdrawal from Timor in 1999, she returned to Timor
to work as an interpreter for the UN's Serious Crimes Unit.

Her arrest shocked many of East Timor's political elite with whom she
mixed socially. She is related to two government ministers and was a
frequent guest at official and diplomatic functions in Dili. She had
known Mr Gusmao since the 1990s when he was in jail in Jakarta.

Mr Ramos-Horta could be brought out of an induced coma after his fifth
operation in Royal Darwin Hospital today, his spokesman, Luke Gosling,
said.