Patrick Walters – The Fraser government refused visas to prominent East Timorese left-wingers forced into exile after the Indonesian invasion of the former Portuguese colony in late 1975.

The Fretilin members included Mari Alkatiri, who last year stepped down as East Timor's first prime minister, and Rogiero Lobato, who recently served as interior minister in the Alkatiri government.

Thirty years ago, the Coalition government of Malcolm Fraser was concerned about the possibility of Australia being used by the Fretilin resistance movement as the base for a government in exile.

Defence and Foreign Affairs Departments advice was not to give Fretilin, then engaged in a liberation struggle against Indonesia's armed forces, any political oxygen.