Venidora Oliveira – The Vice Minister of Finance Helder Lopes said based on the preliminary results of the Population and Household Census 2015, the Timorese population has grown from 1.066.409 in 2010 to 1.167.242 five years on in 2015.

The Vice Minister added the population growth has been consistent and can be disaggregated by gender with 588.561 males and 578.681 females.

Venidora Oliveira – Member of the National Parliament MP Josefa Alvares Soares urged the President of the National Parliament to schedule the debate of a drug law for Timor-Leste to prevent its future negative impacts on the youth in particular.

Jakarta – State lender Bank Rakyat Indonesia plans to re-open its branch office at Timor Leste at the first half of next year, the lender's chief said on Sunday.

John Martinkus – As Indonesian troops fired on a compound of refugees in Dili, John Howard directed the AFP to withdraw. Had they followed orders, they would have left 3000 people to certain death.

Peter Job – In early October the Timor-Leste Prime Minister Rui Maria de Araujo announced that after two years of inconclusive talks his nation was initiating arbitration with Australia on jurisdiction concerning seabed resources in the Timor Sea, which he described as, "an issue of sovereignty and an issue of justice".

The Moreland Council in Melbourne's inner north is the latest Council to call on the Australian Government to immediately enter negotiations with East Timor to establish permanent maritime boundaries in accordance with international law.

Ivo Mateus Goncalves – Forty years has come and gone since East Timor was invaded by Indonesia's military.

On 7 December 1975 Jakarta commenced an occupation of the tiny island that would last 24 years, finally ending in 1999.

Adam Harvey – The 40th anniversary of Indonesia's invasion of East Timor was marked yesterday with a small commemoration at the headquarters of the nation's Kopassus special forces.

The special forces soldiers saw the worst of the fighting in the months following the landings in Dili on December 7, 1975.

East Timor says it's acting on an audit of its agriculture ministry that found irregularities in millions of dollars worth of contracts intended to help East Timor's farmers.

Shane Rosenthal – The impending launch of the Asean Economic Community was marked last month at a summit in Kuala Lumpur. It is a time to showcase Asean's commitment to a region made prosperous through economic cooperation and integration.

Venidora Oliveira – The Director Director for Corporative Services of the Ministry of Education (ME) Antoninho Pires said his ministry continues to lack school inspectors.

He added the ministry currently only has 64 school inspectors for hundreds of schools across the country and because of this some schools have not yet been assessed.

Paulina Quintao – The Executive Secretary of the National Commission For Combating HIV/AIDS in Timor-Leste (KNKS-TL) Daniel Marcal said his commission is undertaking consultations and meetings about the advantages and disadvantages of localising sex work.

He said that a decision about the issue has not been made and that everyone needs to think about this issue.

Paulina Quintao – The National Director for Water and Sanitation Services (NDWS) Gustavo da Cruz said currently there some 2000 households connected to the public water grid in the capital Dili are at least half are paying for 24 hour access to clean water.

Sue Lannin – A recently re-discovered document given to the Australian Embassy in Jakarta suggests Australia may have been aware of Indonesian plans to execute East Timorese independence leaders after the 1975 invasion.

Forty years ago on this day, East Timor first declared its independence. Today – having endured a brutal military occupation to reclaim its Independence in 2002 – it's still striving to achieve full sovereignty.

Steve Cannane, Sashka Koloff and Brigid Andersen – Independent senator Nick Xenophon has called for a royal commission into the spying scandal in which Australian intelligence officers bugged East Timor's cabinet office.

Emma Alberici speaks with Nick Xenophon about his calls for a Royal Commission following Lateline's exclusive report on the spying scandal between Australia and East Timor.

Transcript

Paul Farrell – The independent senator Nick Xenophon has called for a royal commission into Australia allegedly bugging Timor-Leste's cabinet room during trade negotiations.

Steve Cannane, Sashka Koloff and Brigid Andersen – One of Australia's most senior lawyers believes there is a criminal case to answer over an Australian spying operation in East Timor and that senior intelligence officers, even a former cabinet minister, could face prosecution.

Australia's foreign affairs department is expected to make a decision next week on whether to reissue a passport to a key witness in spy allegations concerning oil and gas treaty negotiations with East Timor.

To date, no one – in politics or the bureaucracy – has been held accountable for bugging the East Timor cabinet room. Well, this is embarrassing.

Tony Jones speaks with Peter Galbraith, who was part of the UN transitional administration in East Timor in 2000 and 2001 and a cabinet member in the fledgling nation's first transitional government. He was also the lead negotiator for East Timor during the talks with Australia, aimed at producing a new oil and gas agreement to replace the Timor Gap treaty.

Transcript

Steve Cannane, Sashka Koloff and Brigid Andersen – East Timor's most senior leaders have accused Australia of committing a crime and acting immorally after a spying scandal that rocked the relationship between the two countries.

Timor Leste's government will have to think long and hard about diversifying its economy, Prime Minister John Key says.

New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) information shows the country is in danger of running out of money due to the decline of its oil industry and government overspending. Similar warnings have come from Timor-based NGO La'o Hamutuk.

Timor Leste is running out of money due to the decline of its oil industry and government overspending.

The country, formerly known as East Timor, was brought into independence by a huge New Zealand and Australian effort, that cost five New Zealand lives and hundreds of millions of dollars. But the country risks economic collapse, a generation after it was set up.

Shane Rosenthal, Dili – The impending launch of the ASEAN Economic Community is being marked this week at a summit in Kuala Lumpur. It should also be the time for ASEAN to consider opening the door to a new member.

Rodney Joyce, Singapore – East Timor is seeking Australian public support to try to persuade Canberra to settle a longstanding maritime border dispute over the oil and gas rich waters that lie between the two countries, a senior minister told Reuters.

Sashka Koloff, staff – When Indonesia invaded East Timor in 1975, they effectively sealed off the country to the outside world. No outsider made the perilous journey inside, propagating Indonesia's claim that East Timor's resistance had been crushed.

Paulina Quintao – National Member of Parliament MP Francisco da Costa said the public's money is going to waste because the government does not consider the monitoring results provided by MPs following municipal monitoring visits.

Venidora Oliveira – The Coordinator of Rede ba Rai (Network for Land) organization Roberto Aleixo da Cruz said land disputes continue to be a source of social conflict because a land law has not yet been passed.

Coordinator da Cruz alleges the government, in the name of development, has been taking land and property without a legal basis for it.

Paulina Quintao – The President of Women's Association for Manatuto Municipality (AFM) Clara de Carvalho Ximenes said its members are working with municipal based child protection officials to deliver an awareness raising campaign about children' rights in the community.

Venidora Oliveira – The Security Sector Project Manager of the United Nation Development Program (UNDP) Naldo Rei said the National Police of Timor-Leste (PNTL) has made significant progress in the undertaking of their duties since 2013.

Venidora Oliveira – The government of Timor-Leste through the Ministry of Public Works, Transport and Communication (MPWTC) has made the commitment to pay companies who completed urgent projects dating back to 2013.

Minister of MPWTC Gastao de Sousa said the National Development Agency (ADN) has submitted survey reports to the ministry and that payments are pending.

Paulina Quintao – The Deputy Program Manager of International NGO Marie Stopes International Timor-Leste (MSITL) Juliao da Silva said that over 12,000 women so far have received Family Planning services from January to July 2015.

Paulina Quintao – The Director of the Legal Assistance for Women and Children (ALFeLa) Program Merita Correia said they have prepared five lawyers to provide assistance to victims of gender based violence in the courts.

Paulina Quintao – The Deputy Program Manager of Marie Stope's International Timor-Leste (MSITL) Julio da Silva said the NGO has established mobile clinic units across the municipalities of Timor-Leste to provide rural families with the Family Planning (FP) services.

Paulina Quintao – The Deputy Program Manager of Marie Stopes International Timor-Leste (MSITL), Juliao da Silva, said the MSITL team has been raising awareness to students in basic and secondary schools across Dili about the importance of reproductive and sexual health.

Sadachika Watanabe, Jakarta – East Timor is looking to upgrade its natural-resource and transportation infrastructure, creating new business opportunities for overseas construction companies and plant builders.

China's State Councilor and Defense Minister Chang Wanquan held talks with visiting Minister of Defense of Timor-Leste Cirilo Cristovao in Beijing on Monday.

Balibo, Timor-Leste – The people of Balibo in Timor-Leste marked Friday's 40th anniversary of the killing of Australian-based journalists by invading Indonesian soldiers with a quiet gathering outside the house where television reporter Greg Shackleton painted the Australian flag.

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and its affiliate the Media, Entertainment & Arts Alliance (MEAA) today, commemorate the 40th anniversary of the killing of the Balibo Five in East Timor, with the establishment of a scholarship to develop journalism skills in East Timor.

Molly Schmidt – A son of one of the five Australian-based journalists killed in Balibo, East Timor, has asked the Australian Federal Police to re-investigate the case – on the day 40th anniversary commemorations were held to mark their deaths.

Nick Xenophon and Clinton Fernandes – Forty years ago on Friday, five young men met their deaths in a small corner of a foreign field.

Angelo Risso – Barely a week goes by without Tony Maniaty thinking about Balibo.

Maniaty, an up-and-coming ABC journalist, travelled with a film crew to the East Timorese border town in October 1975, just as the Portuguese colony was about to be overrun by Indonesia.

"The truth is never too young to be told, nor too old." So said Coroner Dorelle Pinch as she summed up the 2007 inquest into the deaths of the Balibo Five in East Timor.

The truth is now 40 years old, and the men's families are still chasing it.

A. Ibrahim Almuttaqi, Jakarta – Four years on since Timor Leste formally applied to become a member-state of ASEAN, the dream of uniting all Southeast Asian nation-states under the ASEAN umbrella has yet to materialize.

Havana – Cuba and Timor-Leste strengthened cooperation mainly in areas such as health, education and agriculture in the context of the official visit here of the Prime Minister of this Asian nation, Rui Maria de Araujo.

Havana – Cuban parliament President Esteban Lazo welcomed today Timor Leste Prime Minister Rui Maria de Araujo, in a meeting that ratified the good state of bilateral relations between the nations.

Havana, Cuba – Having extended the Medical Program of the Family throughout East Timor by November 2016 is the aspiration of Rui Maria de Araujo, its Prime Minister, who takes the Cuban health system as a model for this effort.

Rui Maria de Araujo – Most people will not have even heard of the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste, let alone be able to point out where it is on the world map.

Timor-Leste, the nation whose government I lead, is a half-island nation-state in Southeast Asia. Our closest neighbors are Indonesia to our north and west, and Australia, to the south, across the Timor Sea.