Give Us $100-B And We'll Dump LNG Project: East Timor President

Give our country $100 billion — or stop lecturing us about making money from fossil fuels.

Photo Insert: East Timor President and Nobel Peace Prize winner José Ramos-Horta

That was the message East Timor President and Nobel Peace Prize winner José Ramos-Horta had Wednesday for those raising environmental concerns about his nation’s proposal to build a new gas-processing plant, Nick Perry reported for the Associated Press (AP).

Ramos-Horta was speaking in Australia after the two countries signed a new defense agreement. He delivered his remarks at the National Press Club in Canberra with humor but also with an edge.

East Timor, an impoverished nation of 1.5 million, is hoping to break a 20-year deadlock with the new Australian government over the development of the Greater Sunrise gas field that lies beneath the seabed separating the two countries.

Australia wants the gas piped to an existing gas hub in its northern city of Darwin. East Timor expects more economic benefits if the gas is piped to its south coast.

Ramos-Horta was visiting Australia in part to try and resolve the dispute. A reporter asked how East Timor could justify the project given the climate impacts. Ramos-Horta replied that gas was cleaner than some fossil fuels.

He then listed countries that had benefitted from fossil fuels, including the US and Japan, and then later China and India. Ramos-Horta shared the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize with East Timorese Bishop Carlos Belo for their efforts to end conflict in their homeland.

“But first the Europeans, you were the ones who polluted the whole world with coal, with oil, and everything that you can imagine,” he said.

“And we, unfortunately, discover oil and gas only now. And the Europeans are lecturing us: We have to move away from fossil fuel.” He said the gas field could generate $100 billion or more in revenue.

“I have no authority to make any proposal, but I can make one off the top of my head,” Ramos-Horta said. ”The Europeans, Australia, the US, give us $100 billion and we give up on the Greater Sunrise development. As simple as that.”

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