The East Timor and Indonesia Action Network (ETAN) today called on the United Nations to launch a broad and thorough discussion of the report of Timor-Leste's Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation (known by its Portuguese acronym, CAVR).

Sian Powell's exclusive report on atrocities against the people of East Timor during the 24 years of Indonesian occupation, published in The Australianyesterday, was grim reading, detailing anything up to 180,000 deaths, mainly from starvation.

Sian Powell, Jakarta – good relations with Indonesia have always been of prime importance to the independent nation of East Timor.

The half-island of one million people is surrounded on three sides by giant Indonesia, a sprawling archipelago with a population of 230million.

His Excellency Mr. Kofi Annan
Secretary-General of the United Nations
New York, NY USA
By fax to +1-212-963-7055

Dili, 19 January 2006

Re: Handover of CAVR's report

Sian Powell, Jakarta – The Indonesian military used starvation as a weapon to exterminate the East Timorese, according to a UN report documenting the deaths of as many as 180,000 civilians at the hands of the occupying forces.

Sian Powell – One of the most enduring horrors of the Indonesian occupation of East Timor was the "fence of legs" campaign in 1981, which rounded up civilians – young and old, sick and hungry – and made them march across the island.

Jakarta – The United Nations should publicise a report it was due to receive alleging that Indonesia's occupation of East Timor caused the deaths of up to 180,000 civilians, a rights group said.

The welcome resolution of East Timor's dispute with Australia over oil and gas revenue from the Timor Sea means about $150,000 for every man, woman and child in the recently independent nation.

A deal signed last week between East Timor and Australia to share billions of dollars in revenue from Timor Sea oil and gas deposits has short-changed Asia's poorest country, a rights group says.

The new treaty between the governments of Australia and Timor-Leste to share oil and gas resources from part of the Timor Sea temporarily resolves a long-standing and difficult dispute. However, the East Timor and Indonesia Action Network (ETAN) believes this agreement does not fully serve the rights and interests of the people of Timor-Leste.

[Joseph Nevins: A Not-So-Distant Horror: Mass Violence in East Timor. Cornell University Press. Reviewed by Maire Leadbeater.]

Will the world forget the paroxysm of murderous violence that erupted when the East Timorese voted overwhelmingly for independence on August 30, 1999?

His Excellency Kay Rala Xanana Gusmco
President of the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste
C/o The Embassy of the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste
3415 Massachusetts Avenue, NW Washington, D.C. 20007

Via facsimile: 202 965-1517

Your Excellency:

Nigel Wilson – Maritime boundary negotiations between Australia and East Timor have been put on hold for 50 years under a deal to share the Timor Sea's petroleum riches that will deliver up to $25 billion cash to the fledgling democracy.

The Australian Government has been accused of bullying and short-changing East Timor.

Australia and East Timor have formally signed a treaty to share the revenue from the main oil and gas field in the Timor Sea, ending a two-year dispute.

Dan Box, John Kerin – East Timor Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri has declared that the fledgling nation does not need Australia's help to deal with border skirmishes.

Dr Alkatiri, who is in Australia to sign a resources deal, was responding yesterday to an incident in which East Timorese police shot and killed three Indonesians and former militia members.

Woodside Petroleum on Thursday welcomed the Timor Sea gas agreement between Australia and East Timor but said the Greater Sunrise gas project would remain on hold for now.

Canberra – Australia and East Timor today signed off on a deal to share revenue from the Timor Sea's lucrative energy reserves, resulting in a potential $US10 billion windfall for the tiny nation.

"The Australia East Timor Friendship Association (SA) [AETFA SA) Inc joins the Timor Sea Justice Campaign and other NGOs in expressing concern that the Australian Government is again shortchanging Timor Leste (TL), the poorest nation in the SE Asian region.

Semarang – A group of Timorese-Indonesians living in Central Java demanded on Wednesday a thorough investigation into an incident on Friday in which three former militia members were killed by Timor Leste border police.

"We strongly condemn the shooting," said Batista Sufa Kefi of the National Committee for East Timorese Political Victims.

With the Governments of Australia and East Timor today signing another interim resources sharing agreement for contested petroleum resources in the Timor Sea, an Australian lobby group has vehemently attacked the Australian Government's failure to address the larger and more important issue of permanent maritime boundaries.

Dmli – The Timorese dioceses of Dmli and Baucau and 12 non-governmental organizations today criticized in Dmli the initiative of the Government to sign Thursday an agreement to share petroleum revenues from the Timor Sea with Australia.

Dili – East Timor Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri said Wednesday that his country's police force had acted in self defence when they shot dead three former pro-Jakarta militiamen near the border.

He also criticised Indonesia for failing to prevent militiamen from infiltrating East Timor.

Dili – Police in East Timor who shot dead three ex-militiamen trying to enter the country last week were acting in legitimate self-defense, Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri said Wednesday.

Journalists and freedom of expression advocates in East Timor are calling for international opposition to a new law that would punish defamation with jail time and unspecified fines.

Jakarta – The Indonesian House of Representatives (DPR) on Wednesday denounced the shooting of three Indonesians by Timor Leste border police last Friday (Dec. 6).

"We should remind (the Timor Leste police) that the shooting should be the last. Don't repeat it, or face the consequences," Hopuse Speaker Agung Laksono said.

Nigel Wilson – The Maritime Union of Australia is threatening an international industrial campaign to force oil giant ConocoPhillips to employ more East Timorese on projects north of Darwin.

However the first step in the campaign – a bid to disrupt the loading of the first cargo from the new Darwin Liquefied Natural Gas project – appears to have failed.

The Australian lobby group that has been calling on the Australian Government to negotiate permanent maritime boundaries with East Timor, is now hoping that the temporary resource sharing agreement set to be signed in Sydney this week, will pave the way for Woodside Petroleum to commit to an onshore processing facility in East Timor.

Atambua – Around 1,500 protesters burned pictures of East Timorese President Xanana Gusmao on Monday following the killing of three former pro-Jakarta militiamen by East Timor police near the border with Indonesia.

Dili – A UN-sanctioned panel investigating human rights violations during Indonesia's 24-year occupation of East Timor found that as many as 183,000 people were killed, disappeared, starved or died of illnesses linked to the conflict, an adviser said.

Jakarta – Atambua Bishop Mgr Anton Pain Ratu feels the allocation of 1,500 TNI personnel from the Army's Strategic Reserves Command (Kostrad) on the borders of Indonesia and Timor Leste is too much.

Canberra – It may have become a big deal later, but East Timor did not figure prominently in the deliberations of the Whitlam government in its final year.

Mark Dodd – Notorious former East Timorese militia leader Eurico Guterres is to return home with a personal guarantee for his safety by the country's President, despite a UN war crimes panel indicting him for murders committed in 1999.

Kupang – East Timor's President Xanana Gusmao has said some 16,000 refugees from his country living in Indonesia's neighbouring West Timor province would be welcome to return home.

East Timorese President Xanana Gusmao and former pro-Jakarta militia leader Eurico Guterres agreed Tuesday to work toward reconciliation in the first meeting of the two former arch-foes.

"None has won, none has lost, because we both lost our fighters, so reconciliation is the best way for us," Guterres told reporters after the meeting.

Mataram – Inhabitants of Belu and Timor Tengah Utara (TTU) districts located in the border area shared by East Nusa Tenggara and Timor Leste urgently need the government's help to get out from their misery.

Ahkmad Kusaeni, Jakarta – A decision made during an emergency situation could make a history. If Xanana Gusmao who was arrested in 1992 were executed, East Timor might never secede from Indonesia and the leader of the security disturbance group, Fretilin, would not become an East Timorese president.

Ainslie Chandler – Despite its war-ravaged past, East Timor has all the hallmarks of a tropical paradise. Swaying palm trees, pristine beaches, coral reefs, misty mountains, hot springs and stunning architecture are dotted around the chaotic landscape that is the world's newest nation.

John McBeth – It was five years ago. Sitting at the kitchen table in a small, nondescript house on Dili's sun-baked foreshore, the soon-to-be president of Timor Leste was talking about the future.

Dili – Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri acknowledged Wednesday that his FRETILIN party forces committed "errors" and "excesses" during East Timor's brief civil war in 1975, but he vehemently denied an official report's findings that 3,000 people died in that conflict.

Sydney – The sister of one of the Balibo Five journalists shot dead in East Timor 30 years ago wants their remains exhumed for examination.

Maureen Tolfree, sister of Brian Peters, whose death is the subject of a NSW coronial inquest, believes the remains may hold clues about the manner and cause of the men's deaths.

President Kay Rala Xanana Gusmco
President, Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste
Palacio Das Sinjas Rua Caicoli
Timor Leste

Dear President Gusmco,

Jeff Kingston – The legacies of Indonesia's brutal occupation of East Timor from 1975 to 1999 – when there were at least 102,800 conflict-related deaths – remain divisive in this small, impoverished nation of 800,000 people.

Yemris Fointuna, Kupang – Hundreds of displaced persons from East Timor taking refuge in East Nusa Tenggara province demanded on Monday that the central government compensate them with Rp 263 billion (US$26.3 million) for the assets they left behind in East Timor following the 1999 autonomy plebiscite.

Mark Dodd – At his war crimes trial in Dili in 2001, East Timorese militia leader Joni Marques, facing 13 counts of murder, assault, kidnapping and torture including the cold-blooded killing of a nun, fingered Australian SAS and Indonesian Kopassus special forces as his former trainers.

John McBeth – The commission formed to investigate human rights abuses during Indonesia's bloody 25-year occupation of the former East Timor, now Timor Leste, has just issued its report. There are gory details aplenty, but it is interestingly circumspect about the role of theUS and Australia, as John McBeth discovers in an exclusive preview of the report in Jakarta

Anthony Hubbard – Greig Cunningham has learned the hard way about governments and foreign affairs. His brother Gary, a television cameraman, was killed during Indonesia's attack on Balibo in East Timor in 1975.

Tiarma Siboro, Jakarta – The Indonesia-Timor Leste Truth and Friendship Commission (CTF) plans to summon former Indonesian Military chief Gen. (ret) Wiranto and several other generals in relation with the violence that took place in the then East Timor in 1999 prior to and after an independence referendum.

Dili – The head of East Timor's Catholic Church has written to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan to reaffirm the need for an international tribunal to bring justice for victims of violence during Indonesia's quarter-century occupation of the territory.

Jakarta – A joint truth commission on violence surrounding East Timor's independence vote from Indonesia will try to summon people who may have been involved in the bloodshed next month, the commission said on Friday.