Australia Continues to Support East Timor

By Henry Srebrnik, [Charlottetown, PEI] Guardian

 

A new parliamentary election to be held on May 12 in Timor-Leste (East Timor) will be the second one in less than a year. A minority government formed after elections last July and led by the Fretilin party collapsed in January after its policy program and budget were defeated in parliament.

Ex-rebel leader and independence hero Xanana Gusmao, who is heading an alliance of three opposition parties including his National Congress for Timorese Reconstruction, urged East Timorese to elect the grouping to “strengthen and improve our country in order to bring development to free people from poverty.”

Fretilin Secretary-General Mari Alkatiri also vowed development by creating more special economic zones.

In 1999, about 70 per cent of the economic infrastructure of East Timor was destroyed by Indonesian troops and anti-independence militias when East Timor was struggling to cast off control by Indonesia, which had occupied the small former Portuguese colony in 1975.

In the years after independence in 2002, the country had one of the highest fertility rates in the region, with almost seven births per mother. Most of the population is younger than 25, with unemployment on the rise. More than half the population lives on less than US $1.25 a day.

Though Timor-Leste’s 1.3 million people still face grim poverty, things may be looking up.

Since 2004, almost 80 per cent of East Timor’s gross domestic product has come from the oil field in the Timor Sea, where reserves are projected to run dry by 2023. 

But in March, Gusmao led negotiations with Australia, expanding East Timor’s sea border. The new maritime border treaty determines each nation’s entitlement and ownership of the rich oil and gas reserves in the Timor Sea, including the untapped Greater Sunrise basin, estimated to hold $53 billion worth of gas reserves.

The treaty recognises the rights of both nations, and establishes a special regime for the joint development, exploitation and management of the Greater Sunrise gas fields.

 

Australian help was essential to East Timor’s success in freeing itself from rule from Jakarta. Since then, it has been a major source of aid, not only as the largest bilateral donor of development assistance, but also by ensuring security and stability in the country.

Canberra led the International Force East Timor (INTERFET) military force that helped stabilize the country after it gained independence, as well as the later UN Transitional Administration in East Timor (UNTAET).

Australia also landed combat troops in the country in 2006 to quell ethnic fighting that involved East Timorese police and soldiers. 

About 600 members of the army, known as Loromonu, from the western part of the country, went on strike to protest what they contended was ethnic discrimination and a lack of promotions at the hands of the military leadership.

The last Australian peacekeeping forces left Timor-Leste in December 2012. The East Timorese military continues to receive assistance with training, advice and other forms of support as part of Australia’s Defence Cooperation Program.

This is conducted independently of the Australian military commitment to the UN’s mission in Timor-Leste.

Australia has been the biggest development partner with Timor-Leste. Under the Timor-Leste- Australia Strategic Planning Agreement for Development signed in 2011, both countries work together, in close cooperation, to improve the lives of citizens of Timor-Leste.

The agreement is based on priorities taken directly from Timor-Leste’s Strategic development Plan 2012-2030 on economic development, infrastructure development, social capital, and institution framework.

Australia’s Foreign Policy White Paper of 2017 asserts that Canberra will remain committed to working with Timor-Leste to support its economic growth and governance. Its security and stability “is a fundamental Australian strategic interest.”