East Timor’s struggle for freedom is not yet complete. The East Timorese people still clamor for justice for the grave crimes committed from the 1975 invasion of Indonesia onwards. Top officers of the Indonesian military responsible for the deaths of more than 200,000 East Timorese remain free and unprosecuted for their crimes. The East Timorese also do not have full control over their natural resources. Oil and natural gas will become the main revenue earners in the future for the East Timorese economy. But the fledgling Timorese government is under great pressure from Australia and might lose sovereignty over their oil and gas resources.
IID statement for the 5th anniversary of the East Timor independence vote
Five years ago this month, East Timor voted overwhelmingly for independence. The world marveled at the courage and determination of the East Timorese to be free. But five years after, the world’s collective memory of the East Timorese sacrifice is fading, and so is world diplomatic and financial support for the new nation.
East Timor’s struggle for freedom is not yet complete. The East Timorese people still clamor for justice for the grave crimes committed from the 1975 invasion of Indonesia onwards. Top officers of the Indonesian military responsible for the deaths of more than 200,000 people, fully a third of the Timorese population, remain free and unprosecuted for their crimes.
The East Timorese also do not have full control over their natural resources. East Timor is currently negotiating with its big neighbor Australia on a permanent maritime boundary between the two countries in the Timor Sea. Oil and natural gas will become the main revenue earners in the future for the East Timorese economy. But the fledgling Timorese government is under great pressure from Australia and might lose sovereignty over their oil and gas resources.
As a pioneer of the solidarity movement for East Timor in this region, we reiterate our calls for meaningful independence, justice and self-determination for East Timor.
On the justice issue, we call on the United Nations to form an international tribunal for East Timor for the crimes committed in East Timor from 1975 to 1999. We ask the United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan to seriously consider the July 19, 2004 joint statement of some 106 groups and individuals from inside East Timor calling on him to establish a Commission of Experts or an international Truth Commission to analyse the trials of the Special Panel for Serious Crimes in Dili and the Ad Hoc Human Rights Court for East Timor in Jakarta. These two processes up to now have not provided justice and accountability.
To ensure economic security for East Timor, we ask for international pressure and scrutiny to bear on the ongoing Timor Sea negotiations between East Timor and Australia. We call on the Australian government to negotiate fairly with East Timor so that East Timor will not be robbed of its gas and oil resources.
To the Philippine government, we ask for greater access of East Timorese to Philippine schools, seminaries and training centers, improved diplomatic relations with Dili, support to Filipino business initiatives in East Timor, and the sending of technical experts in the fields of agriculture, community organizing, livelihood training and micro-financing to East Timor.
We cannot turn our backs on East Timor. The Asia-Pacific Coalition for East Timor or APCET was started in Manila in 1994. We stand by the solidarity we forged ten years ago with the East Timorese. A luta continua! True independence to the East Timorese!
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