An Australian with one of the closest associations with East Timor, former diplomat James Dunn, has concerns about East Timor's future as an independent country.
The 74-year-old who has maintained links since he was Australian consul in Dili in the early 1960s is undergoing an emotional experience as the resilient East Timorese claim full independence under the presidency of former resistance leader Xanana Gusmao.
He led a fact-finding mission in 1974 to the former colonial possession abandoned by Portugal and recommended to the then Whitlam government that Australia should support self-determination.
He fled when the Indonesians invaded in 1975 and again, as a United Nations observer, when the pro-Jakarta militia backed by the Indonesian military, TNI, razed the country in 1999.
Back in Dili as a house guest of senior minister Jose Ramos-Horta, Dunn lists East Timor's fragile economy and the need to pursue justice for the atrocities surrounding the autonomy ballot of August 30, 1999, as concerns that are mixed with his elation.
"There's enormous excitement about independence but then I have all these great hopes that the future will shape up well despite a number of problems," Dunn said.
"One of the most serious is, the East Timor economy is quite weak. On the other hand, as the donor nations have shown, the international community has turned out to be quite supportive so that spells well for the future." The World Bank predicted last week that East Timor had a good chance of becoming economically independent in a few years through royalties from Timor Sea gas.
Dunn believes Australia is pushing a hard bargain on the terms of a new Timor Gap Treaty and that the East Timorese have placed a lot of faith in their wealthy neighbour's promise not to rip them off.
"If that [Timor Sea liquid natural gas development] works out, they'll be doing OK, but it'll be quite a while before they're a wealthy nation," Dunn said.
Dunn, a recognised expert on crimes against humanity in East Timor, reported to the United Nations that 24 members of the Indonesian military warranted investigation over the 1999 violence that reduced the country to ruins.
President Gusmao is pushing hard for reconciliation among East Timorese and with Indonesia.
"That does leave a few little problems in the sense that if the East Timorese were to take the view that they should forget the past totally, that would mean that a group of Indonesian generals who really conspired to set up the militia, to prevent the loss of East Timor, to sabotage the UN mission – it's unthinkable that they might totally get away with it," Dunn said.
Dunn advocates that an international tribunal investigates the atrocities that occurred in East Timor and report to Indonesia to bring wrongdoers to justice.