Australia and East Timor appear to remain at loggerheads over multi-billion dollar oil and gas reserves in the Timor Sea, with no resolution announced at the end of three days of talks.

But Foreign Minister Alexander Downer maintained Australia was not ripping off East Timor over the joint oil treaty and said the federal government wanted to help its tiny neighbour.

"We don't want to keep East Timor poor," he told the Seven Network. "People who claim that about Australia or anyone in Australia are just making rhetoric. Of course we don't.

"But we do have to have some commonsense and legally sustainable boundary with East Timor, which isn't going to unravel our other maritime boundaries.

"I think they understand that and I think we are having a good level of negotiation. Australia's interest isn't to rip off East Timor."

Australia's chief negotiator Doug Chester in Dili was unavailable for comment and a Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) spokesman said an announcement on any resolution would probably not be made until tomorrow.

The talks, drawn out over the past year, have stalled repeatedly over the disputed maritime boundary between Australia and East Timor. Australia has been accused of playing hardball over the resources - worth an estimated $41 billion.

Canberra wants the boundary set back closer to East Timor and is seeking most of the royalties from the Greater Sunrise gas field, worth about $9 billion.

It is also asking East Timor to hold off on its permanent boundary claims in return for a guarantee of 90 per cent of revenues from the Joint Petroleum Development Area (JPDA), worth more than $10 billion.

Meanwhile, East Timor advocates said Australian commercial television networks had refused to screen ads lambasting the federal government over the oil and gas negotiations.

The ads, bankrolled by Melbourne businessman Ian Melrose, depict World War II diggers verbally attacking Prime Minister John Howard over the talks with East Timor.

Mr Melrose funded the screening of the advertisements to coincide with this week's meetings. Two of the five ads have already run on national television across the networks. A third is due to be released today.

But the Timor Sea Justice Campaign (TSJC) said the final two ads were refused approval by the Commercials Advice Division (CAD) of Free TV Australia, which represents all of Australia's commercial free-to-air television licensees.

In the ad, Marvin 'Doc' Wheetly, a WWII veteran who served in the 2/2 Independent Company, says he owes his life to the East Timorese people. "John Howard, you are making me ashamed," he says.

The TSJC is calling for a permanent boundary at the midway point between the two countries. "Obviously, the Australian government isn't keen for these messages to become public," TSJC spokesman Tom Clarke said. "We definitely stand by the ads. We don't think they're defamatory."