Jon Lamb – On October 15, a band of angry villagers and former pro-integration militia from East Timor crossed the border from the Indonesian province of West Timor into the East Timorese province of Oecuessi and attacked two startled East Timorese border police. Their motivation is unclear, but it was possibly the result of Indonesian military (TNI) efforts to direct the frustration and anger of chronically impoverished farmers and villagers in the poorest of Indonesia's provinces away from the central government.

Thirty years before to the day, something similar was occurring along another part of the border, but the intention and consequences were far more sinister. Heavily armed TNI special forces, leading a small force including pro-Jakarta militia from East Timor, were making a series of incursions into East Timor – the first phase of TNI operations to prepare for the invasion of East Timor.

On October 16, 1975, five Australian-based journalists were killed in the border town of Balibo when TNI-led forces attacked it. The journalists had travelled to the border to document the TNI incursions, which US and Australian intelligence agencies had been monitoring since September.

Both the US and Australian governments refused to publicly condemn these attacks. Gough Whitlam's Labor government even denied the incursions were taking place.

Eyewitness accounts from the five journalists would have been irrefutable evidence that the Indonesian regime was working to destabilise East Timor to provide the pretext for an invasion. The Whitlam government actively colluded with Indonesia's Suharto dictatorship to cover up the journalists' murder, undoubtedly emboldening the TNI generals in their destabilisation campaign.

Canberra's role in this incident reflected the broader desires of Australian imperial interests in the Asia-Pacific. For East Timor, this meant brutal military occupation so that Australia-based mining and oil interests could more easily access the untapped wealth of the Timor Sea. Australia's acceptance of the invasion and occupation of East Timor also helped open the door for these same business interests to Indonesia itself.

The comments of Australia's ambassador to Indonesia, Richard Woolcott, in a cable sent to the Department of Foreign Affairs in August 1975, accurately portray Australia's approach: "We are all aware of the Australian defence interest in the Portuguese situation, but I wonder whether the department has ascertained the interest of the minister of the Department of Minerals and Energy in the Timor situation.

"It would seem to me that this department might well have an interest in closing the present gap in the agreed sea border and this could be more readily negotiated with Indonesia than with Portugal or an independent Portuguese Timor. I know I'm recommending a pragmatic rather than a principled stand but that is what national interest and foreign policy is all about." Whitlam had already been pushing the "pragmatic" approach, supporting the view that Indonesia would be easier to deal with when it came to settling the disputed maritime boundary issue than an independent East Timor.

East Timor had already become the focus of Australian mining and petroleum interests in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Significant test drilling was taking place in the Timor Sea, in the area known as the Timor Gap – the gap in the maritime boundary, under dispute between Australia and Portugal.

Following the fall of the fascist Caetano regime in Portugal in April 1974, changes began to take place in East Timor. Breaking free from the constraints of more than 500 years of colonial rule, East Timorese political parties and social groups were able to form and openly discuss the nation's destiny.

The leaders of this national liberation movement would have been aware of Portugal's refusal to accept Australia's claim that the maritime boundary be set along the continental shelf, and it is highly unlikely that they would have accepted the Australian government position – hence Woolcott's cable.

The invasion and occupation of East Timor by Indonesia in December 1975 did not, however, result in the "more readily" negotiated settlement that Woolcott hoped for. It turned into a protracted process because Indonesia questioned the Australian government's continental shelf argument and balked at rushing into a settlement. Indonesia set pre-conditions to resolving the issue, such as the recognition of its occupation and integration of East Timor, granted by the Malcolm Fraser Liberal government in February 1978.

Formal talks on the maritime boundary began in 1979, but progress was exceedingly slow. The UN Convention on the Law of the Sea was revised in 1982, with new statutes that weakened the Australian government's claim for the border to be set along the continental shelf. The revised statutes recognised that where states that are opposite each other are less than 400 nautical miles apart, the boundary should be set along the median line.

Frustrated by the slow pace of negotiations, mining and petroleum interests pressured the Bob Hawke and Paul Keating Labor governments to produce a solution. In 1989, an agreement was struck – the Timor Gap Treaty – that divided the disputed area into three zones as part of a temporary (if long-term) arrangement.

Following the 1999 referendum on independence for East Timor, the status and "legality" of the Timor Gap Treaty began to unravel. The John Howard Coalition government argued from the start that nothing should change in the treaty arrangements – that East Timor (or the UN as the administering power during the transition phase) should merely replace Indonesia as a signatory to the treaty.

This was rejected by both the UN Transitional Administration for East Timor, and all of the East Timorese political leaders, non-government organisations and activist groups. The Timor Gap Treaty was rightly condemned as illegal. The Australian government immediately stepped-up a smear and bullying campaign against the "ungrateful" East Timorese.

During the 1979-89 talks with Indonesia on the maritime boundary, Australian government representatives never referred to or implied that their Indonesian counterparts were greedy or ungrateful. Neither did they threaten to withdraw or reduce government aid to Indonesia, as they have done to East Timor for daring to assert its rights under international law.

According to media reports, the Australian and East Timorese governments have now reached agreement on the substantive points of contention about the maritime boundary and resource-sharing arrangements for the Greater Sunrise gas field. But despite the Howard government's propaganda about "creative solutions", Canberra's approach has been to bully and blackmail the East Timorese government into accepting a considerable compromise and forgoing its sovereign rights, permanently.

For many former independence movement activists, the issue of sovereignty is even more important than the significant amount of royalties East Timor stands to loose in the deal (estimated as up to US$50 billion). They cannot countenance the justifications being given for the loss of the sovereign rights that they sacrificed so much for. Along with the victims of the Indonesian military occupation, they are left wondering when they will achieve genuine independence with justice.