Seven years ago Australian Prime Minister John Howard was fêted for the way in which his government helped the people of East Timor — located only 700km from Australia’s north-west coast –gain their independence from Indonesia, which had occupied the island since 1975.
But today, as the East Timorese are bombarded daily by violence and political instability, Howard’s government is being criticised for having neglected this impoverished nation of one million people since independence.
East Timor is today hovering on the brink of civil war. What began as riots last month organised by 600 soldiers who had been dismissed from the 1 400-strong East Timorese army, has now spilled over into daily violence involving a lethal cocktail of pro-Indonesian supporters, impoverished and angry young people and dissident elements of the armed forces. More than 100 000 people have fled their homes as a result of the violence, and chaos in the government. About 70 000 are in camps in the city and 30 000 others have fled the city.
East Timorese Prime Minister Mario Alkatiri — who spent his formative political years with the Fretilin movement in Mozambique — is still claiming to be in control of the government, despite President Xanana Gusmao invoking emergency powers to take over the state’s security role.
Australia — as the most powerful nation in the region — is playing a prominent role both in trying to restore law and order and in the provision of humanitarian aid. It has more than 1 300 troops on the ground in East Timor and they are expected to stay in the country for at least a year.
But while the Australian government has been quick to move on this occasion to assist the East Timorese, some would argue that that hasn’t always been the case.
Last year, when the United Nations peacekeeping force left East Timor after its mandate expired, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan proposed a replacement UN security presence. Australia and the United States opposed the idea. If Annan’s idea had seen the light of day, the level of violence and chaos currently being experienced in the country might not have escalated to the current levels, says James Dunn, a former adviser to the UN Mission in East Timor.
Australia hasn’t made life easier for the East Timorese on the economic front. Between the two countries lie rich oil and gas fields, potentially worth around $4-billion to East Timor. While Australia and East Timor signed a revenue-sharing- agreement in January this year, critics say that Australia’s aggressive negotiating stance ensured drawn-out negotiations between the parties, which has delayed the commencement of many of the oil and gas projects that could benefit the East Timorese people today.
Howard rejects these claims. He says East Timor ”has not been governed well over the past few years, that’s obvious”. And his Defence Minister, Brendan Nelson, dismisses critics who argue that the ugly situation in East Timor might have been alleviated if Australia had not been so focused since 2001 on participating in conflicts far from its shores, such as Iraq and Afghanistan, where it currently has more than 3 600 defence force personnel.
Whatever the recent history, the last thing Australia can afford is another failed state on its doorstep. It has intervened in the past five years to prevent the Solomon Islands and Papua-New Guinea from descending into anarchy. And it has to ensure that Indonesia does not take advantage of the turmoil in East Timor to once again assert its authority over the country.
Howard, Australia’s prime minister for a decade, might find East Timor is his toughest foreign policy challenge yet.