tag:theconversation.com,2011:/id/topics/timor-leste-32740/articlesTimor-Leste – The Conversation2024-02-05T03:40:54Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2223842024-02-05T03:40:54Z2024-02-05T03:40:54ZSovereignty is sacred: in Timor-Leste’s remote Oecusse Enclave, a border dispute threatens to open old wounds<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/573320/original/file-20240205-17-gb5sa9.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=4%2C2%2C954%2C715&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Michael Rose</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In September, Timor-Leste will mark a quarter century since its vote for independence from Indonesia, the conclusion of a 24-year long struggle that left few Timorese families <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesian_occupation_of_East_Timor#Number_of_deaths">untouched</a>. </p>
<p>Reconciliation with its giant neighbour stands out as one of Timor-Leste proudest achievements, but as 2024 begins, a long simmering border dispute, in which a border hamlet faces the prospect of its land being transferred to Indonesia, is stirring both political strife and ghosts many hoped were at rest.</p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/timor-leste-election-offers-an-extraordinary-lesson-in-how-to-build-a-stable-democracy-206421">Timor-Leste election offers an extraordinary lesson in how to build a stable democracy</a>
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<h2>Where is the land?</h2>
<p>The area in question is a hamlet called <a href="https://www.google.com.au/maps/place/Naktuka,+Timor-Leste/@-9.3473574,124.0538669,7268m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x2c550ea704aafb87:0xb7b71c467eda2f81!8m2!3d-9.3469731!4d124.0617151!16s%2Fg%2F11bx56h2nt?entry=ttu">Naktuka</a>. It’s around 1,000 hectares of rare old-growth forest and rice fields on the western edge of Timor-Leste’s <a href="https://www.google.com.au/maps/@-9.2802797,124.1371103,10.75z?entry=ttu">Oecusse</a> (also spelled Oecussi) Enclave. Oecusse is 800 square kilometres of rugged coast and mountains some 70 kilometres west of the rest of Timor-Leste. </p>
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<p>Although Naktuka is home to only around 60 families, and a four hour drive along a coastal track from the nearest major town, to the people of Oecusse it is anything but marginal. Its <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14442210601161732">forests</a> are the domain of Oecusse’s king (<em>usif</em>), and the place he periodically <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/ocea.5240">gathers</a> the Enclave’s clans to celebrate their identity as “people of the dry land” (Atoni Pah Meto) and subjects of their legendary forebear, Lord Benu (Ama Benu). For them, Naktuka is <em><a href="https://devpolicy.org/publications/books/MRose_indigenous-spirits-and-global-aspirations-in-a-southeast-asian-borderlandDevPol.pdf">pah le’u</a></em> (sacred land). </p>
<p>However, in the wake of recent border <a href="http://timor-leste.gov.tl/?p=35443&lang=en&n=1">negotiations</a> between Indonesia and Timor-Leste, concerns have been raised over how much longer they will be free to access it. </p>
<p>At the end of 2023, Naktuka was visited by a team from the Timor-Leste’s government who oversaw the placement of around 76 metal stakes (<em>estaka</em>) along a line some 350 meters inland from the frontier. Suspicions quickly grew it was to be a new border.</p>
<p>Such a border would cede around <a href="https://www.fundasaunmahein.org/2024/01/24/land-border-agreement-with-indonesia-pragmatism-and-high-level-politics-over-sovereignty-and-community-rights/">270 hectares</a> of forest and rice fields to Indonesia.</p>
<p>Subsequent developments didn’t allay concerns. On February 1 2024, the head of the technical team working on the border said the stakes <a href="https://tatoli.tl/2024/02/01/abitante-naktuka-fo-fiar-ba-xanana-luta-too-finaliza-fronteira-terrestre/">did not</a> represent a new frontier, but were being used to assess where one might be placed. </p>
<p>Coupled with an <a href="https://www.facebook.com/CNRTMediaCenter/posts/pfbid02X7TdCALJ4MtR1RbYi4opTkfU5R8JZJNmXpNPFbX9KjhcDN9MM3GR8KmApbigmZ1Yl">announcement</a> by the CNRT Media Centre, mouth-piece of Timor-Leste’s ruling party, that a “win-win” solution could involve dividing Naktuka in half and giving away around 500 hectares, this was cold comfort. </p>
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<p>They even posted a <a href="https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=687045866942460&set=pcb.687045883609125">map</a> from the Indonesian <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Map-of-Land-Boundary-Division-in-Noel-Besi-Segment-Citrana-Source-The-Development_fig1_370053360">Geospatial</a> Information Agency showing how it might look.</p>
<p>In Timor-Leste, this has <a href="https://www.facebook.com/search/top/?q=naktuka">resulted</a> in an angry backlash. The signing of the border agreement, which was to have <a href="https://kemlu.go.id/portal/en/read/5667/berita/indonesia-completes-6-border-agreements-with-neighbouring-countries-in-the-last-9-years">occurred</a> in Jakarta in late January, has been postponed.</p>
<h2>A small hamlet on a divided island</h2>
<p>Recent questions over the ownership of Naktuka stem from unresolved negotiations over the border between Timor-Leste and Indonesia, created when the latter regained its independence in 2002. </p>
<p>While Naktuka is governed by Timor-Leste, in 2005, Timor-Leste <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/09/world/asia/east-timor-and-indonesia-sign-border-pact.html">signed</a> an agreement confirming the status of around 95% of its border with Indonesia, with a small number of areas to be clarified later. Naktuka was one. The reason goes back at least 120 years.</p>
<p>In 1904, when the Dutch and Portuguese moved to finalise the division of Timor, they differed in their interpretation where Oecussi’s borders should be. By 1915 the question was effectively settled. The Portuguese put down <a href="https://www.newmandala.org/the-timor-crisis-and-dom-bonaventuras-plea-for-help-houbens-archival-investigations/">milestones</a> and proceeded to govern <a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/47/Timor_1914.png">Naktuka</a> for 50 years.</p>
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<p>With the Indonesian invasion of 1975, Naktuka, along with the rest of Portuguese Timor, became part of the province of <a href="https://www.loc.gov/item/97682212/">Timor Timur</a>. In 1999 it voted in Timor-Leste’s independence referendum and was <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uti_possidetis">incorporated</a>, as a former part of both Portuguese Timor and Timor Timur, into Timor-Leste. </p>
<p>Indonesia argues that as Naktuka should not (<a href="https://jusmundi.com/en/document/decision/en-boundaries-in-the-island-of-timor-the-netherlands-v-portugal-award-thursday-25th-june-1914">arguably</a>) have become part of Portuguese Timor 110 years ago, it should not be part of Timor-Leste now. Suffice to say this is not an argument that makes such sense to the people who live there today, or many of their compatriots.</p>
<p>Naktuka is remote and poor. After independence its people got on with life. Their days revolved around rice farming and their role as caretakers of the land, including the king’s forest, site of the royal feast of <em>‘seu puah</em> (the communal betel nut harvest). The population grew, slowly, and in many ways Naktuka was similar to any other hamlet in Timor-Leste.</p>
<p>And yet, periodic incidents reminded people of their limbo. In 2013, the Timor-Leste Police were <a href="https://www.easttimorlawandjusticebulletin.com/2013/01/naktuka-border-dispute-needs-diplomacy.html">prevented</a> from building a guard-post. Indonesian soldiers would come across the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-ZkjAyCy5I">frontier</a>, often just bored, but an unpleasant reminder of the occupation. In 2012 there was even a <a href="https://www.easttimorlawandjusticebulletin.com/2013/01/indonesian-military-suspected-of.html">murder</a> which local media reported was committed by people from across the border. The Indonesian press carried the occasional article about citizens of Timor-Leste settling <a href="https://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/01/22/ri-reprimands-timor-leste-over-border-area-violation.html">illegally</a> in an area they called “disputed”, but to residents was simply <a href="https://www.pinterest.com.au/pin/277815870741736776/">home</a>.</p>
<p>There’s no doubt the intentions of Timor-Leste government in seeking a permanent fix on its western border are good, but the idea it can do so by ceding land is surprisingly out of touch with reality. In Timor-Leste sovereignty is sacred, literally, as is the principle of consent and consultation on matters relating to land. Any solution to the situation in Naktuka that ignores this is very unlikely to work.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/222384/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael Rose does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>On a remote stretch of border between Timor-Leste and Indonesia, a dispute over a remote hamlet is stirring memories of conflict many hoped was behind them.Michael Rose, Research Associate, University of AdelaideLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2064212023-05-26T12:37:19Z2023-05-26T12:37:19ZTimor-Leste election offers an extraordinary lesson in how to build a stable democracy<p>After a spirited election campaign, the people of Timor-Leste <a href="https://www.electionguide.org/elections/id/4038/">voted for a new parliament</a> on May 21. The vote was free, fair and largely uneventful. The results were accepted. This is a remarkable accomplishment for democracy.</p>
<p>With roughly 40% of the <a href="https://en.tatoli.tl/2023/05/24/prime-minister-ruak-congratulates-cnrt-over-parliamentary-elections-win/17/">vote</a> and <a href="https://thediplomat.com/2023/05/timor-lestes-opposition-party-wins-most-seats-in-parliamentary-election/">31 out of 65 seats</a>, Xanana Gusmão’s National Congress for Timorese Reconstruction (CNRT) looks set to lead a new coalition government. His coalition would replace the current government consisting of the Fretilin party, which developed from the revolutionary movement that fought for independence from Portugal and then against occupation by Indonesia from the 1970s, along with three smaller parties. </p>
<p>This is simply how democracy should work. But in reality, it’s a major achievement.</p>
<p>Timor-Leste’s story represents <a href="https://academic.oup.com/book/43904/chapter-abstract/370128608?redirectedFrom=fulltext">a decidedly rough ride</a> towards a parliamentary democracy. Following 400 years of colonial rule by Portugal, East Timor enjoyed brief independence in 1975 before being invaded and brutally occupied by Indonesia. This invasion led to the deaths of approximately <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/aug/30/east-timor-indonesias-invasion-and-the-long-road-to-independence">200,000 people</a>.</p>
<p>After Timorese voters endorsed independence in a <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.7249/mr1344af.12">1999 referendum</a>, Indonesia backed-militias unleashed a terror campaign that killed thousands and destroyed nearly all of the country’s infrastructure. International peacekeepers were required to restore order and East Timor was placed under United Nations trusteeship.</p>
<p>Even after <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/1984864.stm">independence</a> in 2002, when the country formally adopted the name Timor-Leste, the country still faced extreme poverty and daunting developmental challenges, all while working to build a new state from the ground up. The rapid departure of UN peacekeepers in 2005 was quickly followed by a <a href="https://www.un-ilibrary.org/content/books/9789210559188c004">political crisis in 2006</a>. </p>
<p>What began with a domestic military dispute between competing regional factions in early 2006, rapidly spiralled into a large-scale, violent clash between domestic political elites. Violence and instability threatened to collapse democratic governance and even the state itself. The crisis ultimately led to 36 deaths and 150,000 people displaced.</p>
<p>International peacekeepers returned to provide security in the aftermath of the crisis. There were <a href="https://www.europarl.europa.eu/cmsdata/212690/Election_report_East_Timor_9_April_2007.pdf">free and fair elections in 2007</a>, which ultimately resolved competition between opposing political elites without violence.</p>
<p>Since then, Timor-Leste has consolidated its democracy. Indeed, it is now the only country in south-east Asia rated by the US-based political advocacy group as “<a href="https://freedomhouse.org/country/timor-leste/freedom-world/2023">free</a>”.</p>
<h2>Surprising success</h2>
<p>How did Timor-Leste achieve this surprising success? As I highlight in my recent book, <a href="https://academic.oup.com/book/44455">Contending Orders: Legal Pluralism and the Rule of Law</a>, the people of Timor-Leste beat the odds by drawing on their history of collective resistance. The country was able to establish new institutions capable of turning aspirations of a democratic state into reality.</p>
<p>The decades-long independence struggle brought together diverse interests and groups, from both inside the country and throughout the world. This diverse coalition worked together to promote a shared vision of a future independent and vibrantly democratic Timor-Leste – a vision that stood in stark contrast to life under authoritarian Indonesian rule.</p>
<p>As independence grew near, these groups splintered in the run up to the country’s first elections in 2001. Two particularly important factions emerged: Fretilin headed by <a href="https://reuters.screenocean.com/record/1725952">Mari Alkatiri</a>, and supporters of <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Xanana-Gusmao">Gusmão</a> who now leads the CNRT. From the start, politics were often messy, even divisive, but also provided voters with a real choice among multiple, legitimate political parties. Parties competing for votes became normal.</p>
<p>Even though the 2006 crisis ended up strengthening democracy in the long term, the violence could easily have been a prelude to major civil strife. Instead, it created an enduring distaste among political elites for open, potentially violent confrontation that could easily undermine, or even destroy, democratic governance.</p>
<h2>Parliamentary democracy</h2>
<p>Constitutionally, Timor-Leste established a <a href="https://www.constituteproject.org/constitution/East_Timor_2002.pdf?lang=en">political order</a> where parliament and the prime minister, not the president, are predominant. </p>
<p>Parliamentarians are selected by an electoral system of proportional representation that incentivises compromise and coalition building. Indeed, coalition governments have <a href="https://thediplomat.com/2018/04/a-new-era-of-political-coalitions-in-timor-leste/">become the norm</a>.</p>
<p>Timor-Leste’s experience also highlights the importance of securing support from powerful non-state local justice community leaders, who still enjoy legal authority rooted in local customs and traditions that often predate even Portuguese rule. These individuals had long maintained order locally and were crucial in resisting Indonesian rule. Since independence, they have been essential to both strengthening the local legitimacy of the state and extending its reach far beyond what would otherwise be possible.</p>
<p>Timor-Leste also holds important lessons for international support. It demonstrates the role external aid can play in providing security and support for building a new state. External assistance was generally not compromised by ulterior motives, such as securing mineral resources or concerns about fighting terrorism. </p>
<p>Moreover, the international community generally followed the lead of national leaders, rather than trying to impose unwanted policies or practices. Timor-Leste also shows the importance of not picking winners. The international community was willing to work with whoever was elected without putting a finger on the scale.</p>
<p>To be sure, Timor-Leste still faces <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/country/timor-leste/overview">serious political challenges</a>, including reducing corruption, fostering sustainable economic development, using the petroleum fund effectively and tackling poverty. Likewise, more needs to be done to fully establish the rule of law and ensure essential rights and freedoms are consistently respected. But these challenges should not obscure Timor-Leste’s extraordinary democratic achievement.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/206421/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Geoffrey Swenson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>After 400 years of Portuguese colonial rule and decades of hostile occupation by Indonesia, Timor-Leste is a flourishing stable democracy.Geoffrey Swenson, Senior Lecturer in International Politics, City, University of LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2056762023-05-19T04:16:49Z2023-05-19T04:16:49ZAs Timor-Leste heads to the polls, here’s how Australia can support its democracy<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/527136/original/file-20230519-21-939te3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Antonio Dasiparu/AAP</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Sunday May 21 is election day in Timor-Leste, when voters decide on 65 members of parliament to represent them. <a href="https://www.newmandala.org/9-notable-features-timor-leste-elections/">Each election</a> is a <a href="https://theconversation.com/for-timor-leste-another-election-and-hopes-for-an-end-to-crippling-deadlock-96203">reminder</a> of the successful regional and international cooperation that led to Timor-Leste’s independence. It’s also a reminder of the importance of Timor-Leste as an <a href="https://www.cfr.org/blog/why-has-east-timor-built-strongest-democracy-southeast-asia">exemplar</a> of democracy, peace and human rights as foundational values.</p>
<p>It is in Australia’s interest that this be nurtured.</p>
<p>As a small state facing many challenges, maintaining these values has regional and global resonance. Timor-Leste is an <a href="https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/ukraine-crisis-timor-leste">important voice</a> both in the Pacific and Southeast Asia. It is a successful state that, despite difficulties, has been able to be <a href="https://www.visionofhumanity.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/PPR-2020web.pdf">peace-loving</a> and sustain relations with Indonesia. </p>
<p>By contrast, democratic regression, or the worst-case scenario of a failed state, would be an enormous setback for the entire region.</p>
<p>What role should Australia play in keeping this democracy strong?</p>
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<p>The history of the Australia-Timor-Leste bilateral relationship is complicated. It includes the vital Timorese assistance during the second world war and Australia’s tacit approval of Indonesia’s 1975 annexation. It also includes Australia leading the United Nations International Force East Timor (INTERFET), which in turn led to Timor-Leste’s transition to independence following a referendum in 1999.</p>
<p>The two nations have been complexly intertwined through Timor-Leste’s journey to independence and democratic development.</p>
<p>There have been instances of <a href="https://theconversation.com/after-a-border-dispute-and-spying-scandal-can-australia-and-timor-leste-be-good-neighbours-121553">unease</a> between the two countries. The most notable was the allegation of Australian spying during negotiations on the Greater Sunrise oil fields. This remains an ongoing issue with the potential to derail ties again.</p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/after-a-border-dispute-and-spying-scandal-can-australia-and-timor-leste-be-good-neighbours-121553">After a border dispute and spying scandal, can Australia and Timor-Leste be good neighbours?</a>
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<p>But there have also been positive steps, such as Operation Astute, an Australian-led military and police deployment. This operation helped stabilise the country during the 2006-2008 political turmoil that culminated in the attempted assassination of President Jose Ramos-Horta and his medical evacuation.</p>
<p>In 2018, Australia and Timor-Leste <a href="https://theconversation.com/australias-deal-with-timor-leste-in-peril-again-over-oil-and-gas-95303">concluded a treaty</a> establishing their maritime boundaries following a United Nations conciliation process.</p>
<p>The complexity of the relationship means Australia needs to be respectful in relations, but it should not stop Australia from being a partner to support Timor-Leste’s democratic processes and institutions.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/527137/original/file-20230519-17-ldumw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/527137/original/file-20230519-17-ldumw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/527137/original/file-20230519-17-ldumw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/527137/original/file-20230519-17-ldumw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/527137/original/file-20230519-17-ldumw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=527&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/527137/original/file-20230519-17-ldumw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=527&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/527137/original/file-20230519-17-ldumw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=527&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Australia and Timor-Leste came to a resolution on a maritime dispute in March 2018.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Antonio Dasiparu/AAP</span></span>
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<p>A <a href="https://asiapacific4d.com/idea/timor-leste-shared-future/">recent report</a> outlines how Australia can support Timor-Leste’s governance in ways that ensure effective, capable and legitimate institutions that are responsive to people.</p>
<p>Australia has a track record of such programs. The eight-year, $72 million <a href="https://www.dfat.gov.au/publications/development/timor-leste-governance-development-program-completion-report">Governance for Development</a> Program supported Timor-Leste agencies to develop good policy and improve systems as well as helping civil society engage with government decision-making. The program worked in areas including public financial management, economic policy, enabling business, public service administration, law reform and financial services. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.tenders.gov.au/Atm/ShowClosed/ac1874f8-4f05-4707-b285-0004e47bcc4b?PreviewMode=False">Partnership for Inclusive Prosperity</a> (PROVISU) will continue to support good governance and economic policy by providing support to Timor-Leste’s central government agencies and economic ministries. Through programs like this, Australia can offer meaningful support to Timor-Leste.</p>
<p>Good governance that responds to citizens’ needs is a perennial problem. Timor-Leste’s nascent bureaucracy makes this a priority issue. Australia should continue to develop partnerships that strengthen institutions so they are able to deal with problems.</p>
<p>An example of this is <a href="https://www.dfat.gov.au/publications/development/timor-leste-partisipa-2021-2031-design-document">PARTISIPA</a>, a ten-year $80 million program to improve access to quality basic infrastructure and services. It works in partnership with national and subnational governments to improve the delivery of decentralised services and village-level infrastructure, such as rural water. It continues Australia’s long-term support for the national village development program and its community-driven processes.</p>
<p>Another area where Australia can contribute is in media.</p>
<p>Timor-Leste has a <a href="https://rsf.org/en/country/timor-leste">vibrant media landscape</a> that is among the freest in the region. Australian can support Timor-Leste to ensure its media are strong and robust as well as free, with public interest is at its core. It can also work with local media to strengthen their ability to educate the general public on governance issues, to hold power to account and to promote the rule of law.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/527141/original/file-20230519-17-3fed87.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/527141/original/file-20230519-17-3fed87.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/527141/original/file-20230519-17-3fed87.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/527141/original/file-20230519-17-3fed87.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/527141/original/file-20230519-17-3fed87.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=509&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/527141/original/file-20230519-17-3fed87.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=509&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/527141/original/file-20230519-17-3fed87.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=509&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Australia can help Timor-Leste maintain a vibrant and free media landscape.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Antonio Dasiparu/AAP</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>An example of this is a recent memorandum of understanding between the <a href="https://about.abc.net.au/press-releases/australias-abc-and-timor-lestes-rttl-sign-mou/">ABC and Timor-Leste’s public broadcaster RTTL</a>, which includes media development programs. The agreement recognises the vital role both organisations play in informing audiences and contributing to democracy. The ABC will work with RTTL to establish a new English-language news service, helping staff enhance their journalism and content-making skills.</p>
<p>Another priority Australia can engage with is the justice system.</p>
<p>Consultations with Timorese civil society organisations, conducted by The Asia Foundation for the <a href="https://asiapacific4d.com/idea/timor-leste-shared-future/">Asia-Pacific Development, Diplomacy & Defence Dialogue (AP4D) report</a>, revealed a particular concern about rebuilding trust in the judicial system. It’s an area with which Australia has not been greatly involved compared to Portugal.</p>
<p>Australia should also engage with Timorese political parties, recognising the important structural role they play in governance. This can complement continued engagement with formal government institutions and the national parliament. Australia should continue to invest in the protection and promotion of human rights.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/asean-leaders-give-in-principle-support-for-timor-lestes-membership-what-does-this-actually-mean-194462">ASEAN leaders give 'in-principle' support for Timor-Leste's membership. What does this actually mean?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Finally, Australia should be a partner for youth civic and political engagement, given the reality of a <a href="https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/timor-leste-china-australia-influence-contest">future political transition</a> from independence leaders to younger generations.</p>
<p>Timor-Leste today lives with a legacy of conflict, which has far-reaching implications. There is significant pressure on government to meet the needs and expectations of the Timorese people. Australia can be a partner to support these goals.</p>
<p>By helping to build a stronger, resilient and prosperous Timor-Leste, Australia is investing in a more secure and stable immediate neighbourhood, which will reap mutual benefits.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/205676/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Melissa Conley Tyler is Executive Director of the Asia-Pacific Development, Diplomacy & Defence Dialogue (AP4D), a platform for collaboration between the development, diplomacy and defence communities. It receives funding from the Australian Civil-Military Centre and the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and is hosted by the Australian Council for International Development (ACFID).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andrea Fahey is a PhD Scholar at the National Security College, Australian National University. She received funding from the Australian Government for her research. She previously worked with the United Nations Peacekeeping Mission in Timor Leste in 2007-2012. </span></em></p>There are several ways Australia can support its northern neighbour, to the benefit of both countries.Melissa Conley Tyler, Honorary Fellow, Asia Institute, The University of MelbourneAndrea Fahey, PhD Scholar National Security College, Australian National UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2031452023-04-18T04:22:21Z2023-04-18T04:22:21ZPenny Wong said this week national power comes from ‘our people’. Are we ignoring this most vital resource?<p>During her <a href="https://www.foreignminister.gov.au/minister/penny-wong/speech/national-press-club-address-australian-interests-regional-balance-power">speech at the National Press Club this week</a>, Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong argued that the “unprecedented” circumstances our region faces “require a response of unprecedented coordination and ambition in our statecraft”. </p>
<p>Wong identified many key tools of Australia’s statecraft: </p>
<ul>
<li>development assistance</li>
<li>infrastructure investment</li>
<li>security cooperation</li>
<li>multilateral diplomacy, and </li>
<li>military capability.</li>
</ul>
<p>She also singled out Australia’s much-debated plan to spend <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/mar/14/aukus-nuclear-submarines-australia-commits-substantial-funds-into-expanding-us-shipbuilding-capacity">A$368 billion</a> to acquire and develop nuclear-powered submarines under the AUKUS security partnership as a key way Australia will “play our part in collective deterrence of aggression”.</p>
<p>Importantly, Wong also also observed that “our national power, more than anything else, comes from our people”. Yet, she noted, the number of Australian diplomats working in the Pacific had actually shrunk under the previous government.</p>
<p>It’s worth reflecting on this in light of the government’s massive spending on submarines – will it have enough left to invest in the people it entrusts to practice its statecraft?</p>
<h2>What is statecraft?</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.adelaide.edu.au/stretton/ua/media/665/statecraftiness.pdf">Statecraft</a> is a word increasingly used by <a href="https://ministers.dfat.gov.au/minister/pat-conroy/speech/csis-global-development-forum-washington-dc">leaders</a>, officials and commentators to describe the actions that states take to try to influence: </p>
<ul>
<li>the global political or economic environment</li>
<li>the policies or behaviours of other countries, or</li>
<li>the beliefs, attitudes or opinions of other countries. </li>
</ul>
<p>The concept of statecraft is <a href="https://asiapacific4d.com/idea/all-tools-of-statecraft/">having its moment</a> as the Australian foreign and strategic policy community contemplates how to counter <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/mar/09/chinas-rising-power-and-influence-in-the-pacific-explained-in-30-seconds">China’s increasingly activist role in the Indo-Pacific region</a>.</p>
<p>Many believe that, to earn the most influence, Australia’s tools of statecraft should come with big price tags and flashy announcements. <a href="https://www.dfat.gov.au/geo/pacific">In the Pacific</a>, for instance, the government is fond of announcing big pledges of developmental aid, infrastructure projects and military assistance. There’s a reason Australian officials spruik fervently on social media every time dollars are promised or spent.</p>
<p>But who are these Australian officials on the coalface of implementing Australia’s statecraft?</p>
<h2>Diplomats are not all the same</h2>
<p>If you look at their <a href="https://twitter.com/AusAmbDili">social media</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/AusHCSols">accounts</a>, Australian officials are treated as interchangeable: an incoming ambassador or high commissioner takes over the account of their predecessor and assumes their persona. </p>
<p>The old pronouncements of their predecessor become their pronouncements. The past openings of Australian-funded facilities become their announcements, even though the person in the social media thumbnail is not same as the one in the commemorative photos.</p>
<p>Officially, foreign policy is as emotionless and cut-and-paste as these official Twitter accounts. Heads of mission should simply take the baton from their predecessor and run with the responsibility of implementing the government of the day’s foreign policy for a while before handing it over to someone else.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1643055122321395712"}"></div></p>
<p>There is no mention of the differences between these individuals. It is as if Australian foreign policy officials are grown from pods in the basement of the R.G. Casey Building, the home of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade in Canberra.</p>
<p>This is of course nonsense. Australian officials are – just like the rest of us – human beings. Each has their own <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13600826.2021.1942798">foibles, habits, strengths and weaknesses</a>. Their individual personalities are adjudicated and assessed intensely in the capital cities where they work, as are those of the Australian police officers, military officials and assorted contractors implementing their programs.</p>
<p>But this reality attracts surprisingly little attention in much of the analysis that is done on the effectiveness of Australia’s statecraft.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/can-australia-recapture-the-spirit-of-middle-power-diplomacy-187990">Can Australia recapture the spirit of middle power diplomacy?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Why kindness and empathy matter</h2>
<p>This is why <a href="https://www.adelaide.edu.au/stretton/our-research/security-in-the-pacific-islands/statecraftiness">we’re studying</a> the role individuals play in implementing Australian statecraft in the Pacific Islands and Timor-Leste. </p>
<p>Through our work on the first season of our <a href="https://omny.fm/shows/statecraftiness/playlists/podcast">Statecraftiness podcast</a>, we’ve found it is individuals, not policies, that are the most important determinants of whether Australia’s statecraft succeeds.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1635593508336615428"}"></div></p>
<p>Two examples from our <a href="https://omny.fm/shows/statecraftiness/statecraftiness-episode-1?in_playlist=podcast">first episode</a> illustrate our point. One senior minister in the Timor-Leste government, <a href="http://timor-leste.gov.tl/?p=13&lang=en">Fidelis Leite Magalhães</a>, told us that when a Timor-Leste minister comes back from a meeting with their partners, the first thing they say is not what line the officials peddled or how much money was pledged, but instead what they were like.</p>
<p>It’s the same story in Papua New Guinea. <a href="https://www.devintelligencelab.com/about-us-bios">Bridi Rice</a>, the CEO of the Development Intelligence Lab in Canberra, reflected on research that analysed the style and approach of expatriate advisers in PNG. For PNG officials, it wasn’t the technical acumen of the advisers that stuck in their memory. It was the emotional intelligence (or otherwise) these individuals brought to the job.</p>
<p>We’ve heard again and again during our project that the diplomats, aid workers, governance advisers, defence officials and police officers who implement Australia’s programs overseas are not clones that can be so easily substituted. It matters if they are kind, thoughtful and empathetic. </p>
<p>The converse is also true. It is the kiss of death to a project if an individual is arrogant or patronising or somehow offends their hosts.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/despite-its-pacific-step-up-australia-is-still-not-listening-to-the-region-new-research-shows-130539">Despite its Pacific 'step-up', Australia is still not listening to the region, new research shows</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Roads and mobile networks only go so far</h2>
<p>This points to an uncomfortable truth. Australia can <a href="https://www.dfat.gov.au/development/performance-assessment/aid-evaluation/strategic-evaluations/road-management-in-papua-new-guinea">build roads</a>, <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-08/afp-recieves-budget-funding-for-solomon-islands-police-training-/101630918">train police</a>, <a href="https://www.foreignminister.gov.au/minister/penny-wong/media-release/telstra-finalises-acquisition-digicel-pacific">buy telcos</a> and build submarines, but if the people representing the country and implementing its policies aren’t polite, respectful and trustworthy, then it might as well not bother.</p>
<p>As Angus Campbell, the chief of the Australian Defence Force, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OejG2HeBAVI&t=1278s">observed</a> last month in India, “If we find ourselves in a setting in which more and more of national wealth is expended more narrowly in the military space […] statecraft is weakened.”</p>
<p>Our project is a reminder that Australia’s security depends on how well the people implementing its statecraft perform. Whether or not the government’s investments in submarines and other expensive tools of statecraft are wise, they shouldn’t come at the expense of investments in people power.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/203145/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joanne Wallis receives funding from the Australian Research Council and the Australian Department of Defence.
This activity was supported by the Australian Government through a grant by the Australian Department of Defence. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and are not necessarily those of the Australian Government or the Australian Department of Defence.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gordon Peake receives funding from the Department of Defence</span></em></p>New research on Australia’s statecraft shows the individuals behind official programs and policies are as important as the work itself.Joanne Wallis, Professor of International Security, University of AdelaideGordon Peake, Affiliate in the Center for Australia, New Zealand and Pacific Studies, Georgetown UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1954912022-11-29T18:35:25Z2022-11-29T18:35:25ZCanada’s Indo-Pacific strategy: The same old starry-eyed thinking about Asian trade<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497704/original/file-20221128-11895-r42rpe.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C6500%2C4378&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly responds to questions at a news conference as Public Safety Minister Marco Mendocino listens in Vancouver on Nov. 27, 2022.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Canada’s new <a href="https://www.international.gc.ca/transparency-transparence/indo-pacific-indo-pacifique/index.aspx?lang=eng">Indo-Pacific strategy</a>, <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-china-trudeau-xi-taiwan-1.6664854">announced with much fanfare by Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly</a>, marks a welcome return of common sense in place of the illusions that have dominated Canada’s approach to Asia for the past quarter-century.</p>
<p>At the same time, there are big gaps that show Canadian policymakers still have a lot of thinking to do. </p>
<p>First off, the strategy strips away the idea of “engagement” with China that Canada pursued under the governments of Jean Chrétien and Stephen Harper. </p>
<p>In this policy of wishful thinking, governments of both political stripes aimed to enmesh China in international norms — in other words, standards on how international politics should operate. </p>
<p>Ottawa hoped this would prompt China to become a faithful follower of the <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/4969800/canada-foreign-relations-chrystia-freeland/">“rules-based international order”</a> so beloved of Canadian leaders. </p>
<p>It didn’t happen that way. </p>
<h2>Norms are disregarded</h2>
<p>Instead, China’s rise was “enabled by the same international rules and norms that it now increasingly disregards,” as the Indo-Pacific strategy paper puts it.</p>
<p>While that’s true, it ignores Canada’s own role. China’s success in changing international norms was actively aided and abetted by Canadians all too keen to get a slice of the vast China trade pie. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-did-xi-scold-trudeau-maybe-because-canada-spent-years-helping-china-erode-human-rights-194899">Why did Xi scold Trudeau? Maybe because Canada spent years helping China erode human rights</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Still, this belated move towards a less starry-eyed vision of China is welcome. So too is the Indo-Pacific strategy’s plan to reinvest in knowledge about China and the region.</p>
<p>No longer does Canada fund Asian studies as it once did. No longer does it even support <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/canada-axes-foreign-studies-program-despite-being-told-of-economic-spinoffs/article4184581/">studies of Canada</a> in Asia, once a valuable way to build ties of understanding. </p>
<p>The Indo-Pacific strategy also repeats the stale bromides of the past. The strategy leads with breathless gasps about the potential of trade with the vast Asian market. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A man in glasses sits talking to an Asian man in an ornate setting with a large painted mural behind them." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497961/original/file-20221129-16-o0inje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497961/original/file-20221129-16-o0inje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=383&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497961/original/file-20221129-16-o0inje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=383&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497961/original/file-20221129-16-o0inje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=383&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497961/original/file-20221129-16-o0inje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497961/original/file-20221129-16-o0inje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497961/original/file-20221129-16-o0inje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Stephen Harper speaks with the Chinese National Peoples Congress Chairman Zhang Dejiang during a meeting in Beijing, China, in November 2014.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Entrenched poverty is neglected</h2>
<p>There is little change here from the 1990s, when visions of thriving Asian markets danced in policymakers’ heads. No talk, then, of the bears of Asian recessions or the entrenched poverty that showed the problems with the sustainability of the 1990s-era “<a href="https://www.adb.org/publications/growth-and-poverty-lessons-east-asian-miracle-revisited">Asian miracle</a>.” </p>
<p>So readers are treated to graphics of Indo-Pacific greatness. One-third of all global economic activity! Half of global GDP! Five economies that together outclass the European Union! This is 1990s rhetoric, recycled almost unchanged for a new century. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="An image shows facts and figures about the Indo-Pacific region." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497653/original/file-20221128-26-cwcz8q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497653/original/file-20221128-26-cwcz8q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497653/original/file-20221128-26-cwcz8q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497653/original/file-20221128-26-cwcz8q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497653/original/file-20221128-26-cwcz8q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497653/original/file-20221128-26-cwcz8q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497653/original/file-20221128-26-cwcz8q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">An image from Canada’s new Indo-Pacific Strategy policy paper.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Government of Canada</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Indeed, little is changed from 1970, when Pierre Trudeau travelled to Japan as prime minister and spoke of Asia not as the Far East, but as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0020702020980771">Canada’s “New West.</a>” </p>
<p>This didn’t mean Mounties would descend to impose law, order and colonialism. It meant that Canada wanted a piece of the trade action. Yet the rhetoric <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/3550355">did not lead to much diversification</a>: trade with Japan ticked up slightly in percentage terms, but Canadian trade increasingly flowed southwards to the United States. </p>
<h2>What about human rights?</h2>
<p>Left almost entirely unmentioned in the new Indo-Pacific strategy: human rights, which have played a key role in Canada-Asia relations for several decades now. Despite <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/nov/29/canada-china-relations-cop15-indo-pacific">Joly’s claims</a>, human rights is not a “key pillar.” The strategy’s five pillars are peace and security, trade, people-to-people exchanges, the environment and more engagement with the region.</p>
<p>Previous international policy statements have at least nodded at human rights. This one relegates rights to a sub-section. There’s no mention, for instance, of Canadians like <a href="https://www.amnesty.ca/huseyin-celil/">Huseyin Celil</a>, held unjustly in Chinese prison facilities for almost 20 years. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/a-diplomatic-boycott-of-the-2022-beijing-olympic-games-could-bring-huseyin-celil-home-170167">A diplomatic boycott of the 2022 Beijing Olympic Games could bring Huseyin Celil home</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Canada once had a reputation for <a href="https://reconciliationtim.ca/indonesia/policy-brief-canada-indonesia-relations-past-and-present/">supporting non-governmental organizations</a> in Asia, funding that flowed through the umbrella description “civil society strengthening.” </p>
<p>The Indo-Pacific strategy speaks of plans to “strengthen dedicated Canadian funding and advocacy to support human rights across the Indo-Pacific, including for women and girls, religious minorities, 2SLGBTQI+ persons and persons with disabilities.” </p>
<p>If this is to succeed, it will need to return to longer-term, sustained support for Asia-based rights organizations. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Protesters hold signs, including one reading Free Hong Kong, on a city street at night." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497967/original/file-20221129-22-lu28hp.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497967/original/file-20221129-22-lu28hp.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497967/original/file-20221129-22-lu28hp.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497967/original/file-20221129-22-lu28hp.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497967/original/file-20221129-22-lu28hp.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497967/original/file-20221129-22-lu28hp.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497967/original/file-20221129-22-lu28hp.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">People hold signs during a protest against the Beijing Winter Olympics outside the Chinese Consulate in Vancouver in February 2022.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Building closer ties to democracies</h2>
<p>Finally, the strategy speaks of closer ties to Asian democracies such as Japan and South Korea. It also speaks of stepping up ties in Southeast Asia. </p>
<p>Yet there is no mention at all of Southeast Asia’s most functional democracy, Timor-Leste — once a priority country for Canadian support, now largely abandoned by Ottawa. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/canadas-east-timor-advocacy-20-years-ago-paves-the-way-for-leadership-today-122385">Canada's East Timor advocacy 20 years ago paves the way for leadership today</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>In a little more than 20 years of independence, Timor-Leste has held numerous free and fair elections and raised its low standard of living in the wake of a near-genocide. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497968/original/file-20221129-18-g63zu5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A bald man with glasses speaks into a microphone at a podium with the UN insignia." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497968/original/file-20221129-18-g63zu5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497968/original/file-20221129-18-g63zu5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497968/original/file-20221129-18-g63zu5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497968/original/file-20221129-18-g63zu5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497968/original/file-20221129-18-g63zu5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497968/original/file-20221129-18-g63zu5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497968/original/file-20221129-18-g63zu5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">José Ramos-Horta, president of Timor Leste, addresses the United Nations General Assembly in September 2022.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Julia Nikhinson)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Timor-Leste even took on Iran — no paragon of women’s rights, to put it mildly — and <a href="https://www.unwomen.org/en/get-involved/step-it-up/commitments/timor-leste">beat it for a seat on the board of UN Women</a>, a United Nations organization that advocates for the rights of women and girls around the world.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/iranian-women-keep-up-the-pressure-for-real-change-but-will-broad-public-support-continue-191631">Iranian women keep up the pressure for real change – but will broad public support continue?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>If ties to democratic regimes in the Indo-Pacific region are to mean anything, Canada must look to smaller, poorer democracies and not only to the obvious trade partners. </p>
<p>It will need to be a rights advocate instead of holding onto old illusions about Asian wealth. </p>
<p>And it will need sustained policy, not a new strategy every few years.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/195491/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Webster receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.</span></em></p>If ties to democratic regimes in the Indo-Pacific region are to mean anything, Canada must look to smaller, poorer democracies and not only to the obvious partners — and become a human rights advocate.David Webster, Associate professor, Human Rights Studies, King's University College, Western UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1310272022-11-13T19:03:40Z2022-11-13T19:03:40ZCash for the winner, the loser for dinner: cockfighting in Timor Leste is a complicated game<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/316581/original/file-20200221-92507-ofubd7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C36%2C4031%2C2969&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Annie Yuan Cih Wu</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The venue is brimming with cheers of excitement from the chicken owners. Despite bets being placed before the game started, the value of a bet can build up as the stronger chicken continues to win. </p>
<p>The atmosphere gets intense.</p>
<p>The brown dirt floor is speckled with red; the smell of this blood mixes with the smoke of cigarettes and floats up to coat the twilight sky. </p>
<p>Blood splashed on the ground by the knife of the winning chicken signifies not only masculinity and competition, but also the efforts dedicated to raising household chickens and the ability to earn an income off bets.</p>
<p>The rule of brutality is the loser cock will also contribute: not through a betting income, but through feeding the family. </p>
<p>In Timor-Leste, cockfighting is a strictly gendered event <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/23820901?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents">limited to men</a>. Women are forbidden to attend, embargoed by the culture, but foreign observers – including myself – seem exempt from the rule. </p>
<h2>Men’s work</h2>
<p>Men gather every afternoon at 6pm in large fields to gamble on cockfighting (<em>futu manu</em>). In one evening, a man can spend from US$10-$200 per game in a country where the median monthly income per household is <a href="http://www.statistics.gov.tl/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/HIES2011_Report_20-_20Final.pdf">US$235</a>. </p>
<p>Cockfighting is a cultural practice that has been prevalent in <a href="https://www.webpages.uidaho.edu/%7Erfrey/PDF/410/Geertz72.pdf">Southeast Asia</a>, <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/521598">South America</a> and the <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/lasr.12094">South Pacific</a> for a long time. It is believed to have originated in South Asia before it was introduced into Greece in the time of <a href="https://www.britannica.com/sports/cockfighting">Themistocles</a>, 524–459 BCE. </p>
<p>Each night there is a series of fights between an agreed number of chickens over several rounds of battles. Each winner chicken will continuously fight to the next round until the ultimate winner is announced. </p>
<p>This traditional cultural activity has been commercialised as a petty cash source and a channel for getting windfalls for Timorese men since the Portuguese colonial era. It is possible to win a few hundred dollars in one day if the fighter chicken is well-trained and strong enough to win several times. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/316585/original/file-20200221-92526-161pbjc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/316585/original/file-20200221-92526-161pbjc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/316585/original/file-20200221-92526-161pbjc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/316585/original/file-20200221-92526-161pbjc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/316585/original/file-20200221-92526-161pbjc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/316585/original/file-20200221-92526-161pbjc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/316585/original/file-20200221-92526-161pbjc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Attending the fights is strictly for men.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Annie Yuan Cih Wu</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Loser cocks are frequently disabled, and a small corner is dedicated for them after each round. Owners take them home to serve for dinner. Timorese households rarely consume protein every meal. Especially in rural households, meat is eaten only a few days a week and these chickens form an important part of the diet. </p>
<p>Cockfighting has multiple advantages for a household: nutritional value, potential extra income, the leisure of excitement and a space for men to engage with peers and <a href="https://academic.oup.com/sf/article/95/4/1341/3102954">demonstrate masculinity</a> and power during the game.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/before-chickens-became-food-for-people-they-were-regarded-as-special-exotica-184582">Before chickens became food for people, they were regarded as special exotica</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Women’s work</h2>
<p>Chicken selling and dealing is reserved for women to earn petty cash and accumulate private savings. </p>
<p>Forbidding women to participate in cockfighting restricts access to fun and highlights the privilege of its masculine nature. But men are not allowed to sell chickens that belong to their wives, mothers, sisters or daughters: that is the women’s traditional “piggy bank”. </p>
<p>One chicken may sell for US$15-40, and one woman can raise up to seven chickens a year, depending on the available space. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/316583/original/file-20200221-92502-siszm8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/316583/original/file-20200221-92502-siszm8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/316583/original/file-20200221-92502-siszm8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/316583/original/file-20200221-92502-siszm8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/316583/original/file-20200221-92502-siszm8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/316583/original/file-20200221-92502-siszm8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/316583/original/file-20200221-92502-siszm8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Chickens can sell for US$15-40.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Annie Yuan Cih Wu</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Permitting only women to be in charge of chicken sales is a security deposit and balancing structure. The family economics cannot be squandered by men’s addiction to cockfighting: the rights of sale are determined by the women. </p>
<p>Men are allowed to keep, train and raise chickens in their own way. They can often be seen exchanging information about their chickens before and after fights. But women are the treasurers in dealing with household chickens. </p>
<h2>Community work</h2>
<p>For the community, the petty cash spent on cockfighting allows the continuity of a Timorese tradition and supports the local economy. Social and communal relations are sustained and the informal economy is supported: cash stays local and is spent locally. </p>
<p>Cockfighting trading and training require multiple business skills that benefit the livelihoods of participants’ families: developing the system to collect betting cash and issue winners’ takings, running events, facilitating the game and selling cigarettes and drinks. </p>
<p>Yet it exists in a vague and informal economic sphere in Timor-Leste: somewhere between a leisure activity to unwind and a commercial trade to make money. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/316801/original/file-20200224-24701-1ep1mza.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/316801/original/file-20200224-24701-1ep1mza.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/316801/original/file-20200224-24701-1ep1mza.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/316801/original/file-20200224-24701-1ep1mza.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/316801/original/file-20200224-24701-1ep1mza.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/316801/original/file-20200224-24701-1ep1mza.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/316801/original/file-20200224-24701-1ep1mza.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Cockfighting is part leisure, part commercial betting.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Annie Yuan Cih Wu</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Winning incomes feed local households, guarantees cash flow and secures protein intake. It can improve food security and nutrition, and can relate incomes to small business. It is also a form of preserving cultural heritage.</p>
<p>After the last round of cockfighting ends, some men gently hold their winning chickens as if they were babies, carry them in light blue nylon string bags to catch a minivan, or pat them softly while walking them home. </p>
<p>In that moment, I see these cocks are more than a tool of income generation. </p>
<p>They are pets, warriors and royal portrait animals for Timorese households.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/twenty-years-after-independence-timor-leste-continues-its-epic-struggle-121631">Twenty years after independence, Timor-Leste continues its epic struggle</a>
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<hr>
<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/131027/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Annie Wu does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Each night there is a series of fights. Each winner chicken will continuously fight to the next round until the last winner is announced.Annie Wu, Senior Research Officer, University of Technology SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1944622022-11-12T03:13:30Z2022-11-12T03:13:30ZASEAN leaders give ‘in-principle’ support for Timor-Leste’s membership. What does this actually mean?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/494909/original/file-20221112-16-92zhy5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Kith Serey/EPA/AAP</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>On Friday, leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)’s member states provided a <a href="https://asean.org/asean-leaders-statement-on-the-application-of-timor-leste-for-asean-membership/">statement</a> announcing “in-principle” support for Timor-Leste to be admitted as its 11th member. So does this mean Timor-Leste’s long wait to become a member of ASEAN is finally over? The short answer is not quite.</p>
<p>It is a positive development that all 10 ASEAN states - Cambodia (current ASEAN chair), Indonesia, Singapore, Brunei, Malaysia, Thailand, Myanmar, Philippines, Laos and Vietnam - appear to have agreed to the move. However, the statement was unclear about when and how Timor-Leste would achieve full membership. </p>
<p>Timor-Leste will not immediately join the association. It will be granted observer status and allowed to participate in ASEAN meetings. The only other state with observer status is Papua New Guinea (PNG). </p>
<p>Since becoming independent in 2002, Timor-Leste has existed outside the region’s defining institution, despite being widely considered a Southeast Asian state. It was also seen to belong in ASEAN when it was incorporated in Indonesia.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1590953435360538624"}"></div></p>
<h2>Timor-Leste’s hard road to membership</h2>
<p>Timor-Leste first applied for membership in 2011 when Indonesia was ASEAN chair. Successive Timorese governments have wanted the country to join ASEAN in order to advance <a href="https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/timor-leste-s-critical-window-asean">national, security and economic</a> interests, and alleviate some of the vulnerabilities that come with being a small state in an increasingly contested region. </p>
<p>The 2011 Timor-Leste <a href="https://www.adb.org/sites/default/files/linked-documents/cobp-tim-2014-2016-sd-02.pdf">Strategic Development Plan</a> envisaged the nation becoming a full ASEAN member by 2015. </p>
<p>Part of the challenge for Dili was convincing Southeast Asian leaders of the value it would bring to the association. Technically, the <a href="https://asean.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/11.-October-2015-The-ASEAN-Charter-18th-Reprint-Amended-updated-on-05_-April-2016-IJP.pdf">ASEAN Charter</a> stipulates four criteria for membership: </p>
<ul>
<li>geographical location</li>
<li>recognition by other states</li>
<li>agreement to be bound by the ASEAN charter</li>
<li>ability and willingness to carry out obligations of membership. </li>
</ul>
<p>It is the last criterion that has been the most troublesome. </p>
<p>As a consensus-based organisation, all 10 existing ASEAN states must agree to admit Timor-Leste. This is not an easy task, given these states have different national interests, political regimes, and levels of economic and social development. This has contributed to perceptions that ASEAN is slow-moving and divided on critical issues, such as the <a href="https://thediplomat.com/2016/07/no-asean-consensus-on-the-south-china-sea/">South China Sea</a> and the <a href="https://asiatimes.com/2022/05/aseans-consensus-failure-in-myanmar/">Myanmar crisis</a>. </p>
<p>There was speculation that Timor-Leste’s growing ties with China could mean it would become a “trojan horse” for Beijing within ASEAN. This overstated China’s influence in the country and understated Dili’s desire for foreign policy independence. </p>
<p>There were also concerns about further expansion of ASEAN given some of the dilemmas presented by Myanmar’s membership, and concerns around domestic instability and conflict.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/mutual-respect-and-genuine-partnership-how-a-labor-government-could-revamp-our-relationship-with-indonesia-183116">'Mutual respect and genuine partnership': how a Labor government could revamp our relationship with Indonesia</a>
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</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Singapore in particular was sceptical about Timor-Leste’s economic and political prospects. It was also concerned Timor-Leste’s membership would undermine its plan for greater <a href="https://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2011/11/19/i-have-my-own-view-sby-tells-pm-lee-hsien-loong.html">economic integration</a> across the bloc.</p>
<p>Given this history, some interesting questions emerge from this announcement. Has Singapore’s leadership altered its view on Timor-Leste’s membership? If so, why?</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/494910/original/file-20221112-21-ki38dx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/494910/original/file-20221112-21-ki38dx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/494910/original/file-20221112-21-ki38dx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/494910/original/file-20221112-21-ki38dx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/494910/original/file-20221112-21-ki38dx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/494910/original/file-20221112-21-ki38dx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/494910/original/file-20221112-21-ki38dx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">ASEAN will develop a roadmap for Timor-Leste to become a full member, including greater ‘capacity-building’.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Does ASEAN think Timor-Leste is “ready” for membership?</h2>
<p>Over the past decade, Timor-Leste has undergone a series of reviews regarding its fitness to be an ASEAN member. ASEAN has three community pillars: political-security, economic, and socio-cultural. In 2016, the community pillars engaged in independent studies that found Timor-Leste needed capacity-building to meet membership requirements. Since then, the pillars have completed <a href="https://asean.org/asean-economic-community-fact-finding-mission-to-timor-leste-shows-progress-towards-asean-accession/">fact-finding missions</a> to assess Timor-Leste’s reforms and human resource capacities. </p>
<p>Several of ASEAN’s joint communiques also framed Timor-Leste’s future membership eligibility in terms of “capacity-building”, including in <a href="https://asean.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Joint-Communique-of-the-54th-ASEAN-Foreign-Ministers-Meeting-FINAL.pdf">2021</a>.</p>
<p>Yet, ASEAN’s precise membership standards for Timor-Leste remain unclear.
In the statement, ASEAN’s leaders agreed they would formalise an “objective fact based criteria-based roadmap” for Timor-Leste’s full membership, including “milestones” that Timor-Leste would have to meet. The aim is for the roadmap to be adopted at ASEAN’s 42nd summit in 2023, when Indonesia will be chair. </p>
<p>The final point of agreement is perhaps the most revealing. The leaders have committed to helping Timor-Leste build its capacity to meet the milestones that will be set out in the roadmap. It seems there may be at least some ASEAN leaders who consider Timor-Leste not yet ready for membership and needing further assistance to meet the entry standards.</p>
<p>The continuing emphasis on capacity building and the absence of a clear timeline could mean the announcement is another stalling tactic. </p>
<p>More optimistically, though, ASEAN might be viewed as an institution where incremental progress should be taken as a positive step. Getting the 10 states to agree in principle is itself a considerable achievement given some of the concerns about Timor-Leste’s capacity. </p>
<p>This decision may also demonstrate that ASEAN is <a href="https://www.straitstimes.com/opinion/asean-is-less-dysfunctional-on-geopolitics-than-it-seems">not as divided and dysfunctional </a>as its critics make out. It is recognition that ASEAN leaders are prepared to work with Timor-Leste to ensure it achieves its long-held membership ambitions.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/194462/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rebecca Strating currently receives funding from Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, US Department of State, Taiwan Foundation for Democracy, and Australia-Japan Foundation.</span></em></p>The nation’s long-held desire to become an ASEAN member is at last moving - but exactly when and how it will achieve full membership remains unknown.Rebecca Strating, Director, La Trobe Asia and Associate Professor, La Trobe University, La Trobe UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1224632020-07-02T20:15:17Z2020-07-02T20:15:17ZWhy Bernard Collaery’s case is one of the gravest threats to freedom of expression<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/344486/original/file-20200629-155299-hrnon8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=58%2C0%2C5392%2C3567&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Lukas Coch/AAP</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>After a lengthy delay due to the coronavirus pandemic, the legal case that constitutes the most significant threat to freedom of expression in this country will soon play out in the ACT Supreme Court. </p>
<p>This is the prosecution of Bernard Collaery, the former ACT attorney-general and lawyer for Witness K, the former ASIS officer turned whistleblower. </p>
<p>Both are charged under section 39 of the <a href="http://classic.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/isa2001216/s39.html">Intelligence Services Act 2001</a>, which deems it a criminal offence for a person to communicate any information that was prepared by the Australian Secret Intelligence Service in pursuit of its functions. </p>
<p>After an ACT Supreme Court ruling last week, significant parts of the trial against Collaery will <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/jun/26/court-rules-key-parts-of-bernard-collaery-trial-to-be-held-in-secret">now be held in secret</a>, but the argument put forward by the attorney-general that certain information in the case must be kept classified is extraordinarily weak. </p>
<p>Collaery’s attorney protested the move, saying</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Open justice is an essential part of our legal system, the rights of defendants and of our democracy.</p>
</blockquote>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1276439028334604289"}"></div></p>
<h2>Background of the case</h2>
<p>The prosecutions arose from the disclosure of information related to a covert ASIS spying operation – <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/east-timor-repeats-accusations-australia-bugged-leaders-in-timor-sea-resources-talks-20131128-2yazd.html">the bugging of the cabinet offices of Timor-Leste</a>. The operation was authorised by Alexander Downer, then-foreign minister, in 2004. </p>
<p>Its purpose was secretly to obtain information about Timor-Leste’s negotiating strategy before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in a case seeking to clarify the country’s maritime boundary with Australia. This was crucial to determining the countries’ competing claims to rich oil deposits in the Timor Sea. The case ended because Australia pre-emptively withdrew from the ICJ’s jurisdiction. </p>
<p>In 2013, Timor-Leste <a href="https://pca-cpa.org/en/cases/37/">took its concerns</a> about the Australian surveillance operation – and the legal and commercial disadvantage it had suffered – to the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague. It briefed Collaery to represent its interests. Witness K was invited to give evidence. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/after-a-border-dispute-and-spying-scandal-can-australia-and-timor-leste-be-good-neighbours-121553">After a border dispute and spying scandal, can Australia and Timor-Leste be good neighbours?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Australian Attorney-General George Brandis, however, <a href="https://theconversation.com/lawyer-and-witness-face-charges-under-spy-laws-raising-questions-of-openness-and-accountability-99143">ordered the confiscation of Witness K’s passport</a> to prevent him giving evidence to the court and <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/asio-raids-office-of-lawyer-bernard-collaery-over-east-timor-spy-claim-20131203-2yoxq.html">ordered ASIO raids</a> on the homes and offices of both K and Collaery. </p>
<p>The raid on Collaery’s premises yielded a copy of the full affidavit he had drafted summarising the case Timor-Leste was to present to the court. From a legal perspective, these raids were scandalous.</p>
<p>Witness K and Collaery were then notified they could be prosecuted for breaches of the Intelligence Services Act. But nothing happened until 2018, when <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/attorney-general-christian-porter-signed-off-on-spy-charges-over-bugging-case-20180628-p4zodj.html">Attorney-General Christian Porter decided</a> the prosecutions should proceed.</p>
<p>Witness K gave notice last year that <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-08-06/witness-k-to-plead-guilty-lawyer-bernard-collaery-face-trial/11387046#:%7E:text=An%20ex%2Dspy%20known%20as,in%20the%20ACT%20Supreme%20Court.&text=They%20told%20the%20court%20their%20client%20would%20plead%20guilty">he would plead guilty</a>, but Collaery decided to contest the charge. </p>
<p>There is a certain Alice in Wonderland quality about all this – everything has been turned upside down. </p>
<p>The two people who acted in the national interest by disclosing alleged unlawful activity by Australia’s intelligence service are the defendants in a criminal case. The government, which initiated the covert operation, has become the prosecutor. Something has gone very wrong. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/345237/original/file-20200702-111298-15n92k7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/345237/original/file-20200702-111298-15n92k7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=426&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345237/original/file-20200702-111298-15n92k7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=426&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345237/original/file-20200702-111298-15n92k7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=426&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345237/original/file-20200702-111298-15n92k7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=536&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345237/original/file-20200702-111298-15n92k7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=536&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345237/original/file-20200702-111298-15n92k7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=536&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">East Timorese protesters outside the Australian embassy in Dili in 2013.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">ANTONIO DASIPARU/EPA</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Possible defences under the law</h2>
<p>So, what are the legal issues that are likely to arise? The real problem for Witness K and Collaery is that section 39 of the Intelligence Services Act has no public interest defence, in other words, they can’t argue that disclosing the confidential information was done in the public interest, and hence, not against the law.</p>
<p>There are two other defences available, but neither fits easily with the facts of the case. </p>
<p>One allows information to be disclosed if it has already been communicated or made available to the public with the authority of the Commonwealth. The facts of this case are widely known in the public arena owing in part to interviews Collaery gave to journalists. The Commonwealth, however, did not provide permission for this disclosure.</p>
<p>The second defence allows the disclosure of information to the <a href="https://www.igis.gov.au/">inspector-general of intelligence and security (IGIS)</a>, who monitors and oversees the activities of the intelligence agencies. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/australias-quest-for-national-security-is-undermining-the-courts-and-could-lead-to-secretive-trials-122638">Australia's quest for national security is undermining the courts and could lead to secretive trials</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Witness K requested IGIS permission to disclose information about the ASIS bugging operation for the purpose of giving evidence to the Permanent Court of Arbitration. He received permission, but the government then withdrew his passport to prevent him from travelling to The Hague. </p>
<p>Witness K and Collaery might have argued the disclosures were made in accordance with the <a href="https://www.humanservices.gov.au/organisations/about-us/our-department/public-interest-disclosure%20act#targetText=Public%20Interest%20Disclosure%20Act,in%20the%20Commonwealth%20public%20sector">Commonwealth Public Interest Disclosure Act</a>, otherwise known as the Whistleblower Act. </p>
<p>Section 41, however, <a href="http://www5.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/pida2013295/s41.html">exempts intelligence information</a> from being disclosed under this act.</p>
<h2>Has the government acted unlawfully?</h2>
<p>At this stage, it is worth reflecting on the illegal activities in which the government may have engaged. It appears likely ASIS undertook an act of criminal trespass in Timor-Leste by planting surveillance devices in its cabinet room. As in every other democratic country, Timor-Leste’s cabinet deliberations are by law secret.</p>
<p>It is customary in international law – and spelled out explicitly in the <a href="https://treaties.un.org/doc/source/RecentTexts/English_3_13.pdf">UN Convention on the Jurisdictional Immunity of States</a> – that nations and their property are immune from the domestic jurisdiction of other countries. So, Australia also transgressed international law by raiding the offices of Witness K and Collaery and confiscating documents that were clearly the property of the Timor-Leste government.</p>
<p>In addition, the law in Australia <a href="https://www.lawcouncil.asn.au/policy-agenda/regulation-of-the-profession-and-ethics/client-legal-privilege">protects legal professional privilege</a>, which guarantees that communications between a lawyer and client are confidential. </p>
<p>By, in effect, stealing Collaery’s extensive legal advice to the Timor-Leste government, ASIO violated this principle. Brandis, however, has <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/george-brandis-defends-asio-raids-on-lawyer-over-spy-claim-20131204-2yq98.html">said</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>No lawyer can invoke the principles of lawyer–client privilege to excuse participation, whether as principal or accessory, in offences against the Commonwealth.</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/345238/original/file-20200702-111269-1s9c3zx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/345238/original/file-20200702-111269-1s9c3zx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345238/original/file-20200702-111269-1s9c3zx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345238/original/file-20200702-111269-1s9c3zx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345238/original/file-20200702-111269-1s9c3zx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345238/original/file-20200702-111269-1s9c3zx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/345238/original/file-20200702-111269-1s9c3zx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Supporters of Bernard Collaery and ‘Witness K’ stage a protest outside the ACT Supreme Court last August.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">LUKAS COCH/AAP</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>How the High Court could view the case</h2>
<p>It is clear nothing permits the government to take actions that are contrary to Australian law or the law of another country. </p>
<p>The defendants could argue, then, that disclosing information for the sole purpose of exposing government illegality should not be prohibited by Section 39 of the Intelligence Services Act. </p>
<p>A conviction in these circumstances would be a travesty, particularly as it carries with it a maximum sentence of two years imprisonment. This is the penalty Collaery and K are facing. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-shaky-case-for-prosecuting-witness-k-and-his-lawyer-in-the-timor-leste-spying-scandal-100446">The shaky case for prosecuting Witness K and his lawyer in the Timor-Leste spying scandal</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Next, it ought to be remembered the High Court has read into the constitution an implied right to freedom of political communication. </p>
<p>It is quite likely the High Court will find the relevant provisions of the Intelligence Services Act are cast so broadly as to transgress this constitutionally guaranteed freedom. If so, the government’s case will fall apart.</p>
<p>Should these arguments be successful, Witness K and Collaery will emerge as the free speech heroes they are. </p>
<p>Even more importantly, the profoundly chilling effect the imprisonment of individuals of conscience would have on political and journalistic freedom in this country will have been avoided. Australian democracy will have repelled a grievous attack.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/122463/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Spencer Zifcak worked with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Timor-Leste in 2004-5.</span></em></p>The lawyer and his client, Witness K, are accused of disclosing information related to a covert ASIS spying operation. These are the legal issues that are likely to be raised at trial.Spencer Zifcak, Allan Myers Chair of Law/Professor of Law, Australian Catholic UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1223852019-08-28T21:52:46Z2019-08-28T21:52:46ZCanada’s East Timor advocacy 20 years ago paves the way for leadership today<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/289949/original/file-20190828-184207-10ps6fq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C1807%2C1195&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Timorese children are seen in 1999 following the referendum on independence from Indonesia.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">East Timor Alert Network</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Can Canada make a difference in international affairs? Can middle powers matter when a global crisis hits? The story of the East Timor independence referendum, <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/latenightlive/east-timor:-20-years-since-the-independence-referendum/11458590">held 20 years ago this Aug. 30,</a> says yes.</p>
<p>Canadian documents tell the story of Canadian actions during the 1999 referendum. Two decades on, they show that bold and sustained Canadian action can pay off. Archival documents tell stories; those stories have lessons for today. </p>
<p>Timor-Leste, as it’s been called since independence, was never expected to gain independence from Indonesia. Experts — politicians and journalists alike — called its freedom a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F002070201006500313">lost cause</a>. </p>
<p><a href="https://prism.ucalgary.ca/bitstream/handle/1880/51199/From_Kinshasa_to_Kandahar_2016_chapter04.pdf?sequence=6">Canada</a>, the <a href="https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB174/">United States</a> and <a href="http://www.sussex-academic.com/sa/titles/SS_Asian/fernandes.htm">Australia</a> all gave Indonesia economic and <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/270904444_Nonlethal_Canadian_Military_Exports_to_Indonesia">military support</a>. In one rare instance of superpower co-operation, Indonesia bought napalm from the Soviet Union and dropped it on Timorese civilians from American-supplied bombers. <a href="https://davidwebster.wordpress.com/2015/05/11/a-crime-against-humanity-confirmed-indonesian-use-of-napalm-against-east-timorese-civilians-1983/">Canadian officials knew</a> about this crime against humanity, but concealed the information.</p>
<p>There was also a <a href="https://www.unsw.adfa.edu.au/school-of-humanities-and-social-sciences/timor-companion/phase-one">global citizen movement</a> in support of East Timor’s right to self-determination. Canada’s <a href="https://hbbarchive.ca/east-timor-alert-network">East Timor Alert Network</a> (ETAN), along with activists in churches, student groups and trade unions, ultimately managed to change Canadian policy, as I recount in my forthcoming UBC Press book <em>Unseen Diplomacies</em>. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/289737/original/file-20190828-184202-vkpvu5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/289737/original/file-20190828-184202-vkpvu5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/289737/original/file-20190828-184202-vkpvu5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=692&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289737/original/file-20190828-184202-vkpvu5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=692&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289737/original/file-20190828-184202-vkpvu5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=692&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289737/original/file-20190828-184202-vkpvu5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=870&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289737/original/file-20190828-184202-vkpvu5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=870&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289737/original/file-20190828-184202-vkpvu5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=870&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Raymond Chan played an instrumental role in Canada push for East Timor’s independence.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(CP PHOTO/Tom Hanson)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In 1998, Canada’s foreign affairs minister Lloyd Axworthy and Raymond Chan, secretary of state for the Asia Pacific region, consulted Timorese resistance leaders and finally backed ETAN’s longstanding call for Canada to support self-determination for East Timor. Chan did so publicly under <a href="https://www.ourcommons.ca/Content/Committee/361/FAIT/Evidence/EV1039097/faitev83-e.htm">parliamentary questioning</a> from the NDP.</p>
<p>When Canadian diplomats proposed mediating between Indonesia and Timorese leaders, the Canadian embassy in Jakarta replied that the offer would very likely be rejected since:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Indonesian foreign minister Ali Alatas has stated that Canadian NGOs are the most ferociously anti-Indonesian in the world and he is skeptical, therefore, of the Canadian government’s ability to resist domestic political pressure and maintain its neutrality.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Timorese leaders, on the other hand, wanted Canada involved. From an <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F030642209702600214">Indonesian prison</a>, top independence leader Xanana Gusmão wrote to Axworthy, saying that Canada, as an incoming member of the United Nations Security Council, was “in a unique position to play a lead role during the upcoming transition in East Timor, which I believe is inevitable.” </p>
<h2>Referendum rejected</h2>
<p>When Indonesia’s government offered a referendum, the Indonesian army objected. It created and armed vicious militia groups that carried out a sustained campaign of violence and intimidation, documented by the <a href="http://www.chegareport.net/">Timorese Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation</a>. </p>
<p>One Canadian on the ground, Jess Agustin of the <a href="https://www.devp.org/en">Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace</a>, reported “a terrified population” with killings “almost expected” as part of a “total cleansing” operation that included loyalty oaths accompanied by the drinking of dogs’ blood, the killing of local resistance leader Manuel Carrascalão’s son, the ransacking of newspaper offices and a host of other attacks.</p>
<p>“It is clear that the military is orchestrating this campaign of terror,” Augustin wrote.</p>
<p>Irish foreign minister David Andrews confirmed that Indonesian authorities backed “the flagrant activities of the militia.” With this link confirmed, Canada backed Timorese self-determination at the UN in February 1999, and called for an international security force to keep the peace. Larger powers — including the United States — objected. Security remained with the Indonesian army, the architect of violence. </p>
<p>The result was many more deaths. Xanana wrote in a letter to Axworthy:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“With this attitude of passivity on the part of the international community, the Indonesian government feels sufficiently confident of its ability to go on arming more groups all over the territory and to intensify the campaign of violence.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p><a href="https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/indonesia/2019-08-28/us-sought-preserve-close-ties-indonesian-military-it-terrorized-east-timor-runup-1999-independence">U.S. documents recently released</a> by the <a href="https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/">National Security Archive</a> tell the story of American policy for the first time. U.S. officials rarely told Canadian counterparts what they were doing. By contrast, Canadian officials expected to work closely with Australia, the major Western power in the region. </p>
<p>They were disappointed. Australian diplomats described the Indonesian relationship as their most important, even ahead of their ties to the United States. As an Australian <a href="https://www.unsw.adfa.edu.au/school-of-humanities-and-social-sciences/timor-companion/howards-letter">researcher writes</a>: “Australian policymakers who were committed to the status quo searched for ways to help the Indonesian military retain East Timor” until public pressure forced them to offer to intervene — but only if Indonesia agreed. </p>
<h2>Canadian money</h2>
<p>Canada pledged $2 million to the United Nations to hold the referendum, plus another $30,000 for the <a href="https://www.laohamutuk.org/misc/TLSA2019/IFET-OPTLSA2019.pdf">International Federation of East Timor</a> (IFET) and other observer missions. </p>
<p>The IFET observer project brought together many activists who had campaigned for a referendum. Its 150 observers included 12 Canadians. Randall Garrison, an Asian studies professor and former director of the <a href="http://pacificpeoplespartnership.org/">Pacific Peoples’ Partnership</a>, became one of the group’s spokesmen. Garrison has been an NDP member of parliament since 2011. </p>
<p>Raymond Chan was also there to observe the referendum. He was clearly impressed by the Timorese determination to vote. He had been awakened at 5 a.m. by the sound of villagers walking to polling stations. When polls opened at 7:30 a.m., he saw more than 4,000 people lined up to vote. <a href="http://pacificpeoplespartnership.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/53-4-Tok-Blong-Pasifik-v53-4-December-1999.pdf">NGO observers told similar stories.</a> </p>
<p>When the UN announced the vote result — 78.5 per cent for independence on a 98 per cent turnout — militia groups erupted. They burned infrastructure, killed more than 1,000 people and forcibly moved at least 150,000 people.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/289734/original/file-20190827-184196-oeotph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/289734/original/file-20190827-184196-oeotph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289734/original/file-20190827-184196-oeotph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289734/original/file-20190827-184196-oeotph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289734/original/file-20190827-184196-oeotph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289734/original/file-20190827-184196-oeotph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289734/original/file-20190827-184196-oeotph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">A Timorese child walks past two armed Indonesian soldiers and a pile of household belongings stockpiled on a pier in Dili in September 1999. Pro-Indonesian militiamen ran rampant when Timor-Leste’s people voted overwhelmingly for independence.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Emmanuel Dunand)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>When UN personnel were ordered to leave, a group of them refused — including former Canadian diplomat Colin Stewart and Canadian historian Geoffrey Robinson. This kept the UN involved and likely helped save Timorese lives, as Robinson shows in <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/titles/9013.html">his book on the violence</a>. </p>
<p>After initially approaching Australia and being rebuffed, Axworthy teamed up with New Zealand foreign minister Don McKinnon to hold a special meeting on East Timor at the APEC summit in Auckland in September 1999.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/289735/original/file-20190827-184192-s1gnf5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/289735/original/file-20190827-184192-s1gnf5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/289735/original/file-20190827-184192-s1gnf5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289735/original/file-20190827-184192-s1gnf5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289735/original/file-20190827-184192-s1gnf5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289735/original/file-20190827-184192-s1gnf5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289735/original/file-20190827-184192-s1gnf5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289735/original/file-20190827-184192-s1gnf5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">East Timorese refugees cheer Australian soldiers arriving on the HMAS Jervis Bay at the port in the provincial capital of Dili in September 1999.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Dita Alangkara)</span></span>
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<p>McKinnon ascribed blame for the mass violence on “the conduct of Indonesia during the last 23 years.” Axworthy took a softer line, but admitted that “we have basically taken over the agenda of APEC.” On Sept. 12, Indonesian president B.J. Habibie finally agreed to an international peacekeeping force. With that agreement in place, Australia agreed to lead an International Force for East Timor. </p>
<p>Throughout 1999, Canada helped exert international pressure. Teaming up with other smaller powers like Ireland and New Zealand, Canada was able to sway Indonesia’s Western allies. This episode gives hints for how Canada might revive its diplomacy today.</p>
<h2>Ideal partners</h2>
<p>Places like independent Timor-Leste are also ideal partners for <a href="https://www.international.gc.ca/world-monde/issues_development-enjeux_developpement/priorities-priorites/policy-politique.aspx?lang=eng">Canada’s feminist international assistance policy</a>.</p>
<p>Twenty years on, Timor-Leste is the <a href="https://www.asiapacific.ca/canada-asia-agenda/15-years-after-independence-whatever-happened-east-timor">most democratic state in Southeast Asia</a>, even while remaining one of its poorest. </p>
<p>Chan pledged that Canada would be a development partner for the long term; that promise has been abandoned under the Stephen Harper and Justin Trudeau governments, though the Canadian embassy in Indonesian supports some valuable smaller projects. </p>
<p>Two decades after it helped the Timorese people gain their freedom, Canada would do well to provide a significant helping hand to the country again.</p>
<p>[ <em>You’re smart and curious about the world. So are The Conversation’s authors and editors.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/ca/newsletters?utm_source=TCCA&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=youresmart">You can read us daily by subscribing to our newsletter</a>. ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/122385/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Webster receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. He is affiliated with the Centro Nacional Chega!, the Timorese centre for truth and reconciliation, and was a member of the East Timor Alert Network/Canada in the 1990s.</span></em></p>Two decades after it helped the Timorese people gain their freedom, Canada would do well to provide a significant helping hand to the country again.David Webster, Associate Professor of History / Professeur agrégé, département d’histoire, Bishop's UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1216312019-08-27T20:10:08Z2019-08-27T20:10:08ZTwenty years after independence, Timor-Leste continues its epic struggle<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/289151/original/file-20190822-170956-2nk5ph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">original</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/Antonio Dasiparu</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>On August 30, Timor-Leste will celebrate the referendum that gave it independence from Indonesia. For the people of this small island, it has been a long battle – one that continues today. You can read our companion story on the island nation’s vexed relationship with Australia <a href="https://theconversation.com/australia-was-once-seen-as-a-liberator-in-timor-leste-then-the-fight-over-oil-began-121553">here</a>.</em></p>
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<p>Indigenous myth attributes the high mountain chain that runs like a spine down the centre of the crocodile-shaped island of Timor to Mother Earth’s dying movements when she retreated underground. This mountain chain is more pronounced in the east, in the territory of Timor-Leste, and often protrudes directly down into the sea along the rugged northern coast.</p>
<p>The island is also surrounded by significant waters. To the south are the vast and <a href="https://www.sbs.com.au/news/australia-approves-controversial-oil-and-gas-deal-with-timor-leste">disputed oil reserves</a>. To the north is a deep exchange pathway for warm water moving from the Pacific to the Indian Ocean, creating conditions for a major “cetacean migration” highway for 24 different species of whale and dolphin.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/for-timor-leste-another-election-and-hopes-for-an-end-to-crippling-deadlock-96203">For Timor-Leste, another election and hopes for an end to crippling deadlock</a>
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<p>In 1944, the anthropologist Mendes Correa described the Portuguese colony of Timor as a “Babel … a melting pot”, and a diverse mix of traditions is still strongly felt today.</p>
<p>The island is a bridge between the Malay and Melanesian world and has as much in common with Pacific Island cultures as Indonesia. The diverse indigenous societies cross the spectrum of matriarchal and patriarchal organisation.</p>
<p>Women are accorded a sacred status within Timorese cosmology and the divine female element is prominent in much indigenous belief. Female spirits dominate the sacred world, while men dominate the secular world. So, while women may hold power in a ritual context, they generally <a href="https://theconversation.com/east-timor-new-president-same-problems-for-women-6587">do not have a strong public or political voice</a>. But they are fighting to change this and now make up a third of members in the national parliament.</p>
<p>By the early 16th century, Portuguese colonisers arrived in the Spice Islands of which Timor was part. This was the beginning of a colonial relationship now 500 years old. </p>
<p>Revolts by Timorese against Portuguese rule were frequent and bloody. Famous Timorese rebel Dom Boaventura lost an armed uprising against his <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Timorese_rebellion_of_1911%E2%80%9312">Portuguese colonisers in 1911</a>, leaving East Timor to be ruled directly from Portugal by the fascist dictatorship of Salazar for most of the 20th century.</p>
<p>The marginal colony remained neglected and closeted from any modern liberalising trends. But in the early 1970s the Timorese independence movement <a href="https://www.unsw.adfa.edu.au/school-of-humanities-and-social-sciences/timor-companion/fretilin">Fretilin</a>, partly inspired by Dom Boaventura, began to oppose Portuguese colonialism, while developing a revolutionary program that included the emancipation of women.</p>
<p>Rosa “Muki” Bonaparte was one of the founders of the nationalist movement and the leader of its women’s organisation. While Bonaparte participated directly in the struggle against colonialism, she also stood against “the violent discrimination that Timorese women had suffered in colonial society”.</p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/australia-and-timor-leste-settle-maritime-boundary-after-45-years-of-bickering-92834">Australia and Timor Leste settle maritime boundary after 45 years of bickering</a>
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<p>After the colonial regime collapsed in 1974, <a href="http://www.chegareport.net/chega-10/">a three-week civil war</a>, secretly manipulated by Indonesian military agents, was the precursor to the larger war and invasion to come.</p>
<p>The victors of the civil war, Fretilin, reconstituted the faction of loyal Timorese soldiers serving in the Portuguese Army as resistance army <a href="http://news.navy.gov.au/en/Aug2015/Fleet/2276/Falintil-Day-celebrated-with-close-neighbour.htm#.XV89UZMzb_Q">Falintil</a>. This army, and the civilian resistance, countered the massive and brutal attack of US-and-Australian-backed Indonesian military for 24 years. The horrors were kept as secret as possible, even to the point of covering up the deaths of those trying to report them, such as the “<a href="http://balibohouse.com/history/balibo-five-roger-east/">Balibo 5</a>”. </p>
<p>After the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-pacific-14952883">Indonesian invasion</a> of December 7 1975, much of the population of East Timor retreated to the mountains, with the resistance living in free zones for the next three years.</p>
<p>However, in November 1978, the Indonesian campaign of annihilation finally encircled the remaining resistance leadership and 140,000 civilians on Mount Matebian, in the east of the island. Most surrendered. They were placed in prisons and “resettlement camps” where many slowly starved to death. The violence of the 24-year Indonesian occupation affected and traumatised the whole of Timorese society.</p>
<p>After the collapse of the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/28/world/asia/28suharto.html">Suharto dictatorship</a> in Indonesia in 1998, President B.J. Habibie agreed to let the Timorese decide their future in a ballot. In his honour, they recently named a bridge after him.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/289157/original/file-20190823-170941-1jziuov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/289157/original/file-20190823-170941-1jziuov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=940&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289157/original/file-20190823-170941-1jziuov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=940&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289157/original/file-20190823-170941-1jziuov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=940&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289157/original/file-20190823-170941-1jziuov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1181&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289157/original/file-20190823-170941-1jziuov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1181&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/289157/original/file-20190823-170941-1jziuov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1181&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Xanana Gusmao was the key negotiator with Indonesia after the independence ballot.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/EPA/John_Feeder</span></span>
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<p>Timor’s pre-eminent leader, Xanana Gusmao, was the key negotiator with UN representatives. He conducted negotiations from his prison house in Jakarta where he’d been since 1992, serving a 20-year sentence for <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/1999/feb/10/indonesia.easttimor">fighting Indonesian forces in his homeland</a>. He persevered with ballot preparations despite growing Indonesian military and militia violence.</p>
<p>In the August 30 1999 referendum, nearly 80% of East Timorese voted for independence by indicating the blue and green National Council of Timorese Resistance (CNRT) flag on the ballot paper.</p>
<p>Extensive military and militia slayings followed the announcement of the vote. <a href="https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/Publications_Archive/archive/TimorLeste">An estimated 1500 East Timorese were killed</a> and more than 250,000 forcibly displaced into Indonesia. About 80% of infrastructure was destroyed. Survivors struggled to feed and look after their families while recovering psychologically from the mayhem.</p>
<p>Stories from the resistance period and 1999 are constantly remembered in Timor-Leste and are hugely significant in the new society. A hierarchy based on past service to the resistance has been established. Pensions and payments to male veterans are one of the biggest expenses for the government.</p>
<p>Anthropologists <a href="https://press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/p160561/pdf/book.pdf">have described</a> an indigenous belief that those who fought and sacrificed “purchased” the nation with their own lives and are owed a living. </p>
<p>Along with celebration there will be much reflection in Timor in the next weeks about the last 20 years of building a nation from “zero” and the 24 years of struggle that came before that. It will consider what they have achieved and what still needs to be done.</p>
<p>Hopefully, Timor-Leste can build a free and fair future for the over 1 million citizens, 60% of them under 18. They include many inspiring, educated young leaders who are ready to take up the responsibility.</p>
<p>As we watch and cheer from the sidelines, we hope for a less eventful and more peaceful future for all Timorese.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/121631/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sara Niner visited East Timor as a backpacker in August 1991 and became a solidarity activist for self-determination of East Timor on her return to Australia. She is now a lecturer in the School of Social Sciences at Monash University. Her latest book is Women and the politics of gender in Post-Conflict Timor-Leste (Routledge UK 2017). She is also the editor of To Resist is to Win: the Autobiography of Xanana Gusmão with selected letters and speeches (Aurora Books, Melbourne, 2000) and author of Xanana: Leader of the Struggle for Independent Timor-Leste (Australian Scholarly Publishing, Melbourne, 2009) </span></em></p>Timor-Leste has had a long and violent history of struggle for self-determination, and while there is much to celebrate, there is also still much to do.Sara Niner, Lecturer and Researcher, School of Social Sciences, Monash UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1031642018-09-13T07:17:42Z2018-09-13T07:17:42ZAs Witness K trial opens, questions over how much of Timor-Leste spying case to keep secret from public<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/236146/original/file-20180913-133904-92wnq3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Witness K and his lawyer are accused of conspiring to reveal that Australia's former foreign minister ordered an espionage operation against East Timor's government.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Antonio Dasiparu/EPA</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-09-12/witness-k-bernard-colleary-spy-case-reaches-court/10237860">first step</a> in the trial of the former Australian spy known only as Witness K and his lawyer Bernard Collaery has taken place in the ACT Magistrates Court. </p>
<p>The two are accused of conspiring to reveal that former Foreign Minister Alexander Downer <a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/foreign-affairs/aussie-spies-accused-of-bugging-timor-cabinet/news-story/3151bbc5a41d3ac76def4b5bfacce661">ordered an espionage operation</a> against the government of East Timor in 2004 in order to gain an advantage in oil and gas negotiations with the newly independent state. Lawyers for both defendants faced off against the prosecution in a small courtroom presided over by Chief Magistrate Lorraine Walker. </p>
<p>Although the directions hearing lasted only 15 minutes and covered preliminary formalities, enough was said to shed light on what is at stake in the case ahead.
The prosecution wants as much of the case as possible to be heard in secret; the defence wants to keep secret only what’s necessary to protect Australia’s national security. </p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/when-whistleblowers-are-prosecuted-it-has-a-chilling-effect-on-press-freedom-in-australia-100008">When whistleblowers are prosecuted, it has a chilling effect on press freedom in Australia</a>
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<p>The prosecution offered “proposed orders” for the magistrate to sign that would effectively ensure a closed trial. </p>
<p>Witness K’s lawyer, Haydn Carmichael, responded by supporting the ongoing suppression of K’s real name. He said that such “anonymity is desired by him and is also a practical solution to possible questions that might arise as to national security.” </p>
<p>To understand the importance of this, it’s worth remembering that the Australian Secret Intelligence Service requires a high degree of operational secrecy. It needs to reassure its agents overseas that it will never reveal their identities. If foreign governments were to learn K’s real name, they might be able to identify his agents in their countries and take countermeasures against them. </p>
<p>Such governments might also be able to take reprisals against K or his family if the opportunity arose. Failure to keep K’s identity secret would also affect ASIS’s credibility in its other operations. People who betray their country would no longer dare risk their safety by dealing with Australia’s spies. </p>
<p>The opening phase of the trial showed both Collaery and Witness K are fully committed to keeping these key pieces of information secret. </p>
<p>However, Carmichael added that anything on the charge sheet apart from K’s real name “is not subject to a claim of national security classification.”</p>
<h2>Public interest vs national security</h2>
<p>The more expansive secrecy desired by the prosecution is another matter altogether. If granted, it would prevent the public from hearing defence evidence that the 2004 bugging operation could itself be considered a crime – a conspiracy to defraud the government of East Timor under <a href="https://law.anu.edu.au/sites/all/files/events/national_security_legal_professional_privilege_and_the_bar_rules_print.pdf">Section 334 of the Criminal Code of the ACT</a>. The defence would be unable to put forth evidence that the operation was planned and ordered in the ACT, as well. </p>
<p>This is a much more powerful legal argument than a moral argument against spying for economic purposes. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-shaky-case-for-prosecuting-witness-k-and-his-lawyer-in-the-timor-leste-spying-scandal-100446">The shaky case for prosecuting Witness K and his lawyer in the Timor-Leste spying scandal</a>
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<p>This is the background of the case: Australia and East Timor met as joint venture partners with consequent mutual fiduciary duties under the 2002 Timor Sea Treaty. They negotiated production sharing contracts, supposedly in good faith. </p>
<p>The espionage operation occurred before and after the October 2004 round of negotiations, when East Timor’s Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri and Secretary of State Jose Teixeira briefed their cabinet colleagues about their negotiating position. Their briefings were bugged – an action that is alleged to have given Australia’s negotiators an unfair advantage. </p>
<p>Cheating or attempting to cheat a joint venture partner in this way is an offence that would carry heavy civil and criminal penalties under the laws of the ACT. </p>
<p>A court order to prevent the public from hearing this would avoid embarrassing the Australian government, but it is arguably irrelevant to national security. </p>
<p>Witness K’s lawyer also urged the magistrate to exercise her “independent function” in determining what constitutes grounds for national security exemptions, and not to accept the prosecution’s claims at face value. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/lawyer-and-witness-face-charges-under-spy-laws-raising-questions-of-openness-and-accountability-99143">Lawyer and witness face charges under spy laws, raising questions of openness and accountability</a>
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<p>Underpinning this request is a <a href="http://eresources.hcourt.gov.au/showbyHandle/1/12378">1982 case</a> between the Church of Scientology and the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation. In this case, the High Court was asked to determine whether it could prevent ASIO from investigating the church in circumstances where it claimed it did not pose a risk to security. </p>
<p>The High Court found against the church but added:</p>
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<p>The court is not bound by the organization’s (ASIO’s) opinion as to what constitutes security or what is relevant to it.</p>
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<p>Despite claims that intelligence and national security are too complex to be understood outside the intelligence community, courts routinely evaluate far more complex evidence in other areas: elaborate taxation schemes, labyrinthine trust arrangements, recondite mergers and acquisitions, sophisticated forensic evidence in criminal trials, and so on. </p>
<p>According to the defence’s argument, the ACT Magistrates Court is within its power to form its own opinion and not defer reflexively to the prosecution’s view of what constitutes national security. </p>
<p>The case has been adjourned until 29th October.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/103164/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Clinton Fernandes receives funding from the Australian Research Council.</span></em></p>The prosecution wants a closed trial, while the defence wants to keep secret only what’s necessary to protect Australia’s national security.Clinton Fernandes, Professor, International and Political Studies, UNSW SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1014102018-08-15T23:03:01Z2018-08-15T23:03:01ZWhen Canada did – and didn’t – stand up for human rights<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/232096/original/file-20180815-2924-1fl15tf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The leaders of the 18 Asia-Pacific economies pose for a family photo in Vancouver in 1997. Indonesia's Suharto is sixth from the left. Protests against human rights violations were kept hidden from Suharto during the summit. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Frank Gunn</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Justin Trudeau’s government is under fire not only from Saudi government officials, but also from some Canadians who have <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/saudi-arabia-tweet-sanctions-canada-twitter-1.4777825">implictly criticized</a> Global Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland for being too aggressive in advocating for the release of Saudi human rights activists. </p>
<p>A tweet from the minister expressed her support for the activists, while her department followed up the next day with another seeking the “immediate release” of Samar Badawi and Nassima al-Sadah. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1025030172624515072"}"></div></p>
<p>None of it was anything unusual: Western diplomats call for the “immediate release” of political prisoners all the time. </p>
<p>Canada’s <a href="https://montrealgazette.com/news/national/opinion-canadian-arms-sales-to-saudi-arabia-human-rights-and-raif-badawi">Parliament unanimously called for the “immediate release” of jailed Saudi blogger Raif Badawi</a> (Samar’s brother) in 2015. That followed a similar <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/quebec-stands-firm-on-support-for-saudi-blogger-raif-badawi/article23755574/">unanimous motion for Badawi’s “immediate release” by the Quebec National Assembly</a>. </p>
<p>The same U.S. State Department official who <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/article-us-sidesteps-getting-involved-in-escalating-saudi-canada-dispute/">now asks Canada and Saudi Arabia to sort out their dispute</a> called on Russia earlier this year to <a href="https://twitter.com/statedeptspox/status/1004124328731045888">“immediately release” Ukrainian prisoners</a>. Navi Pillai, then-United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, <a href="https://news.un.org/en/story/2014/07/472742-saudi-arabia-un-concerned-harsh-sentences-against-human-rights-defenders">urged Saudi authorities in 2014</a> “to immediately release all human rights defenders.” Saudi Arabia imposed no sanctions on the U.N. – instead it stayed in, and soon afterwards sought and won a seat on U.N. Human Rights Council.</p>
<p>“Saudi Arabia must immediately free women human rights defenders held in crackdown,” <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=23270&LangID=E">nine U.N. experts added</a> in June 2018 — again prompting no Saudi attack on the UN or its Human Rights Council (of which the Saudi kingdom remains a member). </p>
<h2>Nothing remarkable</h2>
<p>So there’s little remarkable in Freeland’s anodyne call on Twitter for the “immediate release” of two Saudi activists. It is typical diplomatic language, and actually falls short of what the United Nations human rights system has said on several occasions. </p>
<p>What is remarkable is that <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-saudi-arabias-bold-move-has-nothing-to-do-with-canada/">Saudi government reaction</a> has allowed Canada to be portrayed as a human rights champion even as it continues to <a href="https://www.opencanada.org/features/latest-saudi-behaviour-another-reason-cancel-arms-deal/">arm Saudi Arabia</a> and thus implicitly accepts Saudi human rights violations. </p>
<p>The incident recalls other times when authoritarian regimes have reacted with anger to Canadian words on human rights. Some lessons might be drawn from these past incidents. </p>
<p>There were similar clashes between Canada and Indonesia back in the 1990s, a time when Indonesia’s military regime was a lightning rod for human rights concerns in ways similar to Saudi Arabia today. </p>
<p>In 1991, Indonesian soldiers opened fire on unarmed protesters in East Timor, now Timor-Leste. They had invaded the former Portuguese colony in 1975 and had occupied it ever since, at the cost of more than 100,000 dead. The <a href="https://www.unsw.adfa.edu.au/school-of-humanities-and-social-sciences/timor-companion/santa-cruz">massacre at the Santa Cruz cemetery</a> in the Timorese capital, Dili, prompted a wave of protest in Canada. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231749/original/file-20180813-2909-1nsqvmo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231749/original/file-20180813-2909-1nsqvmo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231749/original/file-20180813-2909-1nsqvmo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231749/original/file-20180813-2909-1nsqvmo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231749/original/file-20180813-2909-1nsqvmo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=513&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231749/original/file-20180813-2909-1nsqvmo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=513&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231749/original/file-20180813-2909-1nsqvmo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=513&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Children hold photos of the victims of the 1991 Santa Cruz massacre during the 19th commemoration in Dili, East Timor, in November 2010.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Jordao Henrique)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Barbara McDougall, foreign minister in Brian Mulroney’s Conservative government, <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=yWkWnQRy7WsC&pg=PA174&lpg=PA174&dq=mcdougall+freezes+aid+indonesia&source=bl&ots=7CnQEze3hy&sig=ptVgYUO7Qg9vcIU2cmnamkCKCp4&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwib7MLvmuPcAhXnxlkKHfm7COYQ6AEwAHoECAAQAQ#v=onepage&q=mcdougall%20freezes%20aid%20indonesia&f=false">froze three planned aid projects to Indonesia</a> and stopped permitting Canadian arms sales to the Suharto regime. </p>
<p>When the Netherlands also froze its aid, Indonesia responded with fury. It <a href="http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/12686/">rejected any future Dutch aid</a> and forced the dissolution of the Dutch-led consortium that co-ordinated foreign aid to Indonesia in favour of a more compliant Consultative Group on Indonesia. </p>
<p>Indonesian anger also targeted Canada, as Canadian foreign affairs files reveal. Ottawa was “treating us like a child,” complained one Indonesian cabinet minister. Another accused Canada of a “colonial mentality.” The Canadian Business Association in Jakarta warned against “meddling in the internal affairs” of Indonesia. </p>
<h2>McDougall stood firm</h2>
<p>Yet <a href="http://etanaction.blogspot.com/2016/11/25-years-after-santa-cruz-massacre-did.html">despite lobbying by Canadian businesses</a> and by Trade Minister Michael Wilson, McDougall declined to grant new aid or permit arms sales to Indonesia. Canadian diplomats worked quietly to maintain open channels with Indonesian counterparts, and McDougall stood firm. Opposition parties agreed and even called on her to go further. Canada maintained its position and bilateral relations continued relatively smoothly. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231751/original/file-20180813-2903-1pei01e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231751/original/file-20180813-2903-1pei01e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=782&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231751/original/file-20180813-2903-1pei01e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=782&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231751/original/file-20180813-2903-1pei01e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=782&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231751/original/file-20180813-2903-1pei01e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=983&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231751/original/file-20180813-2903-1pei01e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=983&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231751/original/file-20180813-2903-1pei01e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=983&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Gov. Gen. Adrienne Clarkson (right) shares a laugh with Barbara McDougall after presenting her with the Order of Canada during a investiture ceremony at Rideau Hall in October 2001.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(CP PHOTO/Jonathan Hayward)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Public protests in Canada, however, continued to spark Indonesian government rage. In 1994, Guelph University held an arms-length review of its regional development project in Indonesia. When the review handed down a critical comment on human rights in Indonesia, <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=JMfP-kb7QiAC&pg=PA196&lpg=PA196&dq=guelph+university+indonesia+sulawesi+timor&source=bl&ots=FqcJOt8UZ-&sig=V_Skj13vq66KgmVfdSkAZq4aiYQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwj54OH4nePcAhXLslkKHSYZC_EQ6AEwAnoECAkQAQ#v=onepage&q&f=false">the Indonesian government immediately pulled the plug</a>, giving project staff six weeks to get out of the country.</p>
<p>When a Timorese refugee in Canada, <a href="https://greenvillage-timor.org/about-bella/">Bella Galhos</a>, started to campaign for Timorese human rights from her new home in Ottawa, Indonesian diplomats tried to pressure her through her family. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231755/original/file-20180813-2906-1cx0of0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231755/original/file-20180813-2906-1cx0of0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231755/original/file-20180813-2906-1cx0of0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231755/original/file-20180813-2906-1cx0of0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231755/original/file-20180813-2906-1cx0of0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231755/original/file-20180813-2906-1cx0of0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231755/original/file-20180813-2906-1cx0of0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Bella Galhos at a news conference in Ottawa in September 1999.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(CP PHOTO/Fred Chartrand)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Benjamin Parwoto, Indonesia’s ambassador to Canada, <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=fMJADwAAQBAJ&pg=PA215&lpg=PA215&dq=bella+galhos+parwoto&source=bl&ots=QcXuaX4ulX&sig=AVp3mF0mFLZMvhSS3-IkMEqPlGY&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwio--2snuPcAhWjzlkKHQxXCHMQ6AEwDXoECAYQAQ#v=onepage&q&f=false">visited Galhos’s mother in Dili</a> accompanied by a military escort, making what appeared to be threats. </p>
<p>Galhos went public and Parwoto was raked over the coals in the Canadian media and summoned for a tongue-lashing by Lloyd Axworthy, foreign minister in Jean Chrétien’s Liberal government. </p>
<p>Through this diplomatic clash, Canadian diplomats remained firm that they would advocate for the safety of a Canadian resident’s family. Galhos’s family was a valid topic of Canadian concern, not an Indonesian internal affair. The parallel to current events is clear: Canada spoke out for Samar Badawi in part due to previous advocacy for her brother Raif, whose wife, <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/ensaf-haidar-raif-badawi-saudi-canada-relations-1.4775315">Ensaf Haidar, lives in Quebec</a> with their children. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231752/original/file-20180813-2921-1q9aagu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231752/original/file-20180813-2921-1q9aagu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231752/original/file-20180813-2921-1q9aagu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231752/original/file-20180813-2921-1q9aagu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231752/original/file-20180813-2921-1q9aagu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=522&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231752/original/file-20180813-2921-1q9aagu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=522&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231752/original/file-20180813-2921-1q9aagu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=522&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Ensaf Haidar is seen in this photo standing in front of a poster of her husband, Raif Badawi, in June 2015 in Montreal.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Paul Chiasson</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In these early 1990s cases, Canada’s government stated concerns on human rights grounds and did not back down when Indonesian officials responded with anger and threats. It did not use tweets, a form of communication that did not yet exist, but it did use the 1990s equivalent — written statements made available to the media and the public. </p>
<p>Canada emerged with less credit in 1997, when it was scheduled to host the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit at the University of British Columbia. </p>
<h2>The APEC protests</h2>
<p>Chrétien and Axworthy were keen to make sure the summit succeeded, and pressed hard for Gen. Suharto to attend. Yet <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/we-were-at-this-tipping-point-apec-protests-at-ubc-continue-to-shape-politics-20-years-later-1.4417358">activists in Canada</a> continued to make Indonesia’s human rights record a public controversy. They plastered the streets of Vancouver and other cities with posters of Suharto’s face and the slogan “Wanted: for crimes against humanity.” </p>
<p>This enraged Indonesian diplomats, who called the posters “soft terrorist tactics” and threatened a boycott of APEC and other damage to Canada-Indonesia relations. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/5CWNKp0Uyyw?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">CBC News.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The cost to obtain Suharto’s presence included a promise to spare the Indonesian president the sight of protesters. When activists armed with arrest warrants tried to carry out a citizens’ arrest of Suharto, they were promptly arrested by RCMP officers. </p>
<p>The RCMP later used pepper spray to stop protesters from scaling a fence that marked off the APEC meeting zone, and forcibly cleared the roads leading out of the meeting area at summit’s end, using force to keep Ottawa’s promises that Suharto would not witness any protesters.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231754/original/file-20180813-2900-swzpjw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231754/original/file-20180813-2900-swzpjw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=551&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231754/original/file-20180813-2900-swzpjw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=551&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231754/original/file-20180813-2900-swzpjw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=551&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231754/original/file-20180813-2900-swzpjw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=692&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231754/original/file-20180813-2900-swzpjw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=692&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231754/original/file-20180813-2900-swzpjw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=692&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A demonstrator is assisted after getting pepper spray in her eyes when police used the spray to break up a demonstration at the APEC Summit in Vancouver in November 1997.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Dan Loh)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/police-behaviour-at-apec-97-poses-fundamental-questions-that-go-far-beyond-who-got-pepper-sprayed-and-why/article767820/">police crackdown on protests at APEC</a> saw Canada’s government painted as an enemy rather than a defender of free speech. </p>
<p>Faced with Indonesian anger and threats, Canada had surrendered to Indonesian demands. It emerged looking weak and won no favours from Indonesia in return. </p>
<p>When Axworthy considered offering Canadian “good offices” to mediate the East Timor dispute, the Indonesian foreign minister refused on the grounds that “Canadian NGOs are the most ferociously anti-Indonesian in the world and he is skeptical, therefore, of the Canadian government’s ability to resist domestic political pressure and maintain its neutrality.” </p>
<h2>Public pressure advances human rights</h2>
<p>The comparison of these 1990s cases suggests that when confronted with threats, Canada best serves its interests by standing firm. It also suggests that public expressions of diplomatic concern, rather than “quiet diplomacy” alone, are a useful tool for rights advocacy. </p>
<p>Indonesia felt the growing pressure so much so that, by 1998, it allowed a <a href="https://www.unsw.adfa.edu.au/school-of-humanities-and-social-sciences/timor-companion/countdown">referendum in East Timor</a> to resolve the issue one way or the other — a Timorese demand that Indonesia’s government had refused for many years. In that referendum, the Timorese opted massively for independence. </p>
<p>The Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste is now southeast Asia’s most democratic state and makes <a href="https://www.asiapacific.ca/canada-asia-agenda/15-years-after-independence-whatever-happened-east-timor">useful and creative diplomatic contributions </a> to this day. Public debate in Canada and other countries over human rights in Timor and Indonesia helped make this possible. </p>
<p>If there is a lesson from Canada-Indonesia clashes, it is that Canadian rights advocacy, both private and public, can be useful — and that Canada should not surrender to threats from authoritarian states to abandon advocacy. </p>
<p>Ironically, Canada’s words on human rights in Timor and Indonesia were stronger than those offered recently by Freeland on Saudi Arabia — and unlike Freeland’s words, were sometimes backed by concrete actions. </p>
<p>The Saudi incident, in fact, has displayed a stark gap between Canada’s strong words on human rights, in the Badawi case and others, and the lack of teeth behind those words — shown best by Canada lecturing others on human rights while trying to sell arms arms that in turn will be used to violate these very human rights.</p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/canadas-checkered-history-of-arms-sales-to-human-rights-violators-91559">Canada’s checkered history of arms sales to human rights violators</a>
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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/101410/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Webster receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.</span></em></p>Canada’s clashes with Indonesia in the 1990s over human rights abuses contain lessons for the current Canadian-Saudi Arabian diplomatic dispute.David Webster, Associate Professor of History, Bishop's UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1004462018-07-24T04:39:27Z2018-07-24T04:39:27ZThe shaky case for prosecuting Witness K and his lawyer in the Timor-Leste spying scandal<p>Much of the <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/prosecution-of-witness-k-and-his-lawyer-is-a-disgraceful-act-of-revenge-20180701-p4zou5.html">media commentary</a> on the government prosecution of Witness K and his lawyer Bernard Collaery has focused on government duplicity in suppressing the trial until it had its oil and gas treaty signed with Timor-Leste. </p>
<p>But this focus on government hypocrisy has neglected the accountability of the director of public prosecutions, Sarah McNaughton. The <a href="https://www.cdpp.gov.au/prosecution-process/prosecution-policy">prosecution policy of the Commonwealth</a> says:</p>
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<p>The decision to prosecute must not be influenced by any political advantage or disadvantage to the government. </p>
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<p>McNaughton’s job is to be the key politically independent actor in the process. She must be a check on state political revenge. </p>
<p>This is why the case should of course be in open court, so the public can see how the DPP justifies its independence in the case. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/when-whistleblowers-are-prosecuted-it-has-a-chilling-effect-on-press-freedom-in-australia-100008">When whistleblowers are prosecuted, it has a chilling effect on press freedom in Australia</a>
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<p>The reason people are worried about the case is that it has <a href="http://www.chicagotribune.com/sns-bc-as--australia-spy-charged-20180629-story.html">the appearance of state revenge</a> against Witness K, who complained through proper channels about the illegality of the bugging he was asked to do, but a decade on served the public interest by blowing the whistle. </p>
<p>Alexander Downer was foreign minister when our international intelligence services were moved away from their counter-terrorism work to focus on commercial espionage on behalf of oil magnates who later <a href="https://www.internationalaffairs.org.au/australianoutlook/the-story-of-the-shameful-timor-prosecution/">offered him a lucrative consultancy</a>. Witness K went public after Downer started working for the consultancy.</p>
<p>So, let the public see in open court whether this is, or is not, a coin-for-the-crown-case that rightly provoked a whistleblower, and not a political revenge case. </p>
<h2>Public confidence has been shaken</h2>
<p>An even greater concern is that K’s lawyer, Collaery, has been swept up in the government’s prosecution. </p>
<p>From assault to complex commercial crimes, it is common for both sides to make allegations of criminality against the other. We expect the DPP to show independence in assessing who is the greatest victim of crime in complex cases like this. That person will be the least likely to be prosecuted. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1021551477297311744"}"></div></p>
<p>The prosecution policy of the Commonwealth also requires the DPP to take into account the views of crime victims in deciding how to manage its deliberations, not only about whether to prosecute. In this case, the public needs to see what kind of victim support services are being provided to Collaery. </p>
<p>For example, the DPP should be asking the government as one of the alleged offenders to make one very public announcement. This is that Australia will continue to abide by the spirit of the <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-03-04/icj-orders-australia-to-keep-east-timor-files-sealed/5296444">International Court of Justice order</a> that the government keep sealed the documents it seized from Collaery’s office in 2013. </p>
<p>The Commonwealth should also assure the public that it will continue to desist from spying on Collaery’s legal work and any bugging or invasion of Collaery’s office. </p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/lawyer-and-witness-face-charges-under-spy-laws-raising-questions-of-openness-and-accountability-99143">Lawyer and witness face charges under spy laws, raising questions of openness and accountability</a>
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<p>Further, the prosecution policy says the government should avoid cases that “undermine the confidence of the community in the criminal justice system”. </p>
<p>That confidence has already been shaken by this case. It will be further shaken if much of it were heard in secret. “Openness” and “accountability” are specified in the policy, binding the DPP to “maintain the confidence of the public it serves”. </p>
<p>Citizen confidence that counter-terrorism laws would not be used against civilians is a public issue. It seems these laws are now hanging over Witness K and Collaery, who most Australians view as patriots rather than terrorists. </p>
<h2>Question of resources and timeliness</h2>
<p>Lastly, the prosecution policy emphasises that prosecutorial resources are limited. Only those cases most worthy of prosecution should go forward. </p>
<p>Banking and insurance crimes are a real threat to the security of our financial system. These are the kinds of cases where the “public interest” test demands more focused resources, not cases against public-spirited civil servants. </p>
<p>Another element of the prosecution policy is that the passage of time since the alleged offence occurred should also be taken into account. </p>
<p>In this prosecution, the passage of time has been taken into account in the wrong way, delaying prosecution until a political interest of the government has been realised. </p>
<p>Rarely have the courts in our country faced such a moment of truth for our justice values.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/100446/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>John Braithwaite does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Prosecuting whistleblowers has the potential to further shake public confidence in Australia’s criminal justice system.John Braithwaite, Professor, School of Regulation and Global Governance, Australian National UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1000082018-07-19T18:50:58Z2018-07-19T18:50:58ZWhen whistleblowers are prosecuted, it has a chilling effect on press freedom in Australia<p>Fear is a tricky thing. It’s often hard to distinguish between what is real and perceived danger. US President Donald Trump, being more comfortable with autocrats than democratic leaders, is arguably a real danger to the world order. </p>
<p>But a former Australian spook <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/national/timor-spy-scandal-former-asis-officer-facing-prosecution-20150621-ghtp17.html">blowing the whistle on our spy agencies</a> eavesdropping on an impoverished neighbour to gain advantage in a business deal? Embarrassing for the government, absolutely. But dangerous to national security? Really?</p>
<p>The Turnbull government’s decision to <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/mediawatch/transcripts/s4865159.htm">prosecute</a> Witness K (a former Australian spy) and his lawyer Bernard Collaery, is yet another example of punishing messengers speaking truth to power. </p>
<p>Witness K blew the whistle on Australia’s eavesdropping on the newly formed Timor-Leste government during negotiations over an oil and gas treaty in 2004. Not a good look, to put it mildly. </p>
<p>It used to be that when governments were caught spying, they denied the allegations then wore the embarrassment in the public eye. Not anymore in Australia.</p>
<h2>Chilling effect of security laws</h2>
<p>This is the continuation of a pattern that started with the terror attacks on the US on Sept. 11, 2001.</p>
<p>In our recently published <a href="http://www.anthempress.com/in-the-name-of-security-secrecy-surveillance-and-journalism">book</a>, I and a number of colleagues document and track the impact that anti-terror and national security laws have had on in-depth public interest journalism in Australia and a number of other countries. We conclude it has become much harder for journalists to hold governments to account for what is being done in the name of security.</p>
<p>Australia is a potent case in point. <a href="http://www.anthempress.com/in-the-name-of-security-secrecy-surveillance-and-journalism">Since 2001,</a> 64 new or amended national security and anti-terror laws have been passed. <a href="http://www6.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/viewdb/au/legis/cth/num_act/taaara2015623/">Meta-data retention laws </a>for internet service providers and telecommunication companies have made it very hard for journalists to protect confidential sources. The new <a href="https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Bills_Legislation/Bills_Search_Results/Result?bId=r6022">espionage and foreign interference law</a> that just passed in parliament makes it a potential crime for journalists to receive, read and store confidential, security-related documents. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/data-retention-plan-amended-for-journalists-but-is-it-enough-38896">Data retention plan amended for journalists, but is it enough?</a>
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<p>Add to this the decision to take Witness K and his/her lawyer to court, and a pattern of a government drunk on security powers emerges.</p>
<p>In our book, we use Italian philosopher Georgio Agamben’s <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books/about/State_of_Exception.html?id=NTZBBfnmYowC&redir_esc=y">“state of exception”</a> framework to analyse this situation. Agamben argues that some nation states use a fear-driven paradigm to continuously increase their anti-terror and national security powers to a point where they reach a state of constant exception/emergency justified by a high-threat level. </p>
<p>The Turnbull government had the choice not to charge Witness K. Another high-profile whistleblower and current independent member of parliament, Andrew Wilkie, did <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-06-28/wilkie-uses-parliamentary-privilege-to-reveal-intel-charges/9919764">not mince words</a> when he labelled the prosecution of Witness K a disgrace and said K should be given the Order of Australia for disclosing the Australian bullying of Timor-Leste. </p>
<p>Instead, K and Collaery now risk becoming “political prisoners” in Australia’s “pre-police state”, in the words of Wilkie.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/new-bill-would-make-australia-worst-in-the-free-world-for-criminalising-journalism-90840">New bill would make Australia worst in the free world for criminalising journalism</a>
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<p>Wilkie <a href="https://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/03/12/1047431088668.html">resigned from the Office of National Assessment</a> in the lead-up to the 2003 Iraq war to warn the Australian public there was no case for war. We now know that not only was he right, but the Iraq conflict, led by the <a href="https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/cfr/international/slot1_032803.html">Coalition of the Willing</a> of which Australia was a member, was the greatest foreign policy blunder since the second world war. </p>
<p>The depth of the blunder was laid bare in the UK’s <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-report-of-the-iraq-inquiry">Chilcot report</a>, a 2.6 million-word document that examined the British government’s reasons for going to war in Iraq (and took seven years to complete). </p>
<p>It’s symptomatic we haven’t had the equivalent of a Chilcot inquiry in Australia. It’s yet another example of how Australian political leaders have refused to explain and wear the consequences for poor decisions and embarrassing actions.</p>
<h2>Press freedom at stake</h2>
<p>A few days ago, Reporters Without Borders published its annual <a href="https://rsf.org/en/australia">Press Freedom Index (PFI)</a>. Surprisingly, Australia had improved six places from 25th in 2016 to 19th in 2017. But the general comment about Australia in the index should not give the government reason to celebrate:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Whistleblowers who disclose information about conditions in the refugee centres or operations by the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation are now exposed to the possibility of imprisonment. A telecommunications law has opened the way to surveillance of the meta-data of journalists’ communications. In January 2018, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s government yet again proposed legislation that would jeopardise the confidentiality of journalists’ sources.</p>
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<p>I know for a fact that the Australian rapporteurs to the PFI will view the prosecution of Witness K extremely dimly. A government that hunts down whistleblowers is on the slippery slope towards a police state in which press freedom will be under increasing pressure. Shooting the messenger is a tool used by autocrats and is not worthy of a mature liberal democracy. </p>
<p>It will be interesting to see what ranking Australia gets in the 2018 Press Freedom Index.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/100008/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Johan Lidberg does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Targeting Witness K and his lawyer in the Timor-Leste bugging case shows a government increasingly hostile to the media.Johan Lidberg, Associate Professor, School of Media, Film and Journalism, Monash UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/953032018-05-24T20:10:06Z2018-05-24T20:10:06ZAustralia’s deal with Timor-Leste in peril again over oil and gas<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/220068/original/file-20180523-51102-1dz1y7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The central element of the Timor Sea dispute seems far from resolved. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/Caroline Berdon</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In April, Australia and Timor-Leste <a href="https://theconversation.com/australia-and-timor-leste-settle-maritime-boundary-after-45-years-of-bickering-92834">reached agreement</a> on their maritime boundaries in the Timor Sea. This resolved a longstanding source of contention between them.</p>
<p>The potential benefits of this historic breakthrough are now in peril, because the critical issue of how the shared oil and gas of the Timor Sea are to be developed remains in dispute.</p>
<h2>Breakthrough on maritime boundaries</h2>
<p>Australia and Timor-Leste’s boundary agreement was achieved thanks to a unique dispute resolution process: the United Nations Compulsory Conciliation Commission. The commission was initiated under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (<a href="http://www.un.org/depts/los/convention_agreements/convention_overview_convention.htm">UNCLOS</a>).</p>
<p>Because both Australia and Timor are parties to UNCLOS, Timor was able to invoke a compulsory conciliation process. It was the first time this has occurred. </p>
<p>Australia was at first reluctant to engage in the UNCC process. It <a href="https://www.sbs.com.au/news/australia-loses-bid-to-reject-compulsory-conciliation-with-timor-leste">lost its argument</a> that the commission did not have the competence to negotiate the dispute. Australia did then engage with the process in good faith.</p>
<p>Indeed, the success of the UNCC was in large part due to the willingness of both parties to participate in good faith. A series of <a href="https://www.pcacases.com/web/sendAttach/2049">“confidence building” measures</a> in 2016 helped build trust between the states.</p>
<p>By January 2017, Australia had <a href="https://theconversation.com/whats-behind-timor-leste-terminating-its-maritime-treaty-with-australia-71002">agreed to terminate</a> the existing Certain Maritime Agreement on the Timor Sea (CMATS). In return, Timor-Leste dropped two international legal cases it had initiated against Australia.</p>
<p>The process set up a neutral commission to run facilitated negotiations over a year, although sessions ultimately ran from July 2016 to February 2018. While participation in the conciliation was compulsory for the parties, it differed from an arbitration process, such as an international court, because the commission’s recommendations could only be non-binding. A crucial aspect of these facilitated negotiations were the discussion papers that allowed both states to think creatively about solving the dispute.</p>
<p>Ultimately, the process succeeded in its primary aim of helping Australia and Timor-Leste to resolve their long-running dispute in the Timor Sea. The breakthrough came in July 2017, when the countries outlined to the commission the points on which they were willing to compromise.</p>
<p>On August 30, an agreement on maritime boundaries, revenue split and an <a href="https://www.pcacases.com/web/sendAttach/2230">action plan</a> for their engagement in the joint venture was reached. The maritime boundary treaty was signed on April 6 2018. </p>
<h2>Deadlock over downstream developments</h2>
<p>On May 9 2018, the commission, to little media fanfare, released <a href="https://www.pcacases.com/web/sendAttach/2327">its report</a> and recommendations on the conciliation.</p>
<p>The report provides valuable insights into the ongoing disputes over development of the <a href="http://www.theguardian.com.au/story/5269768/aust-east-timor-sign-greater-sunrise-deal/?cs=5">Greater Sunrise complex of gas fields</a> located in the Timor Sea – a critical issue for Timor-Leste’s future economic security and development.</p>
<p>Australia and Timor-Leste asked the UNCC to extend its mandate to include the development concept for Greater Sunrise. This extended the sessions beyond the initial one-year period.</p>
<p>Despite its significant success in helping the states agree on maritime boundaries in the Timor Sea, the report indicates little progress was made on the question of how Greater Sunrise gas would be processed.</p>
<p>Crucially, Timor-Leste’s lead negotiator and newly re-installed prime minister, Xanana Gusmao, has consistently advocated a pipeline to the south coast of Timor-Leste to support the development of a Timorese oil and gas processing hub.</p>
<p>The Sunrise Venture Partners (SVP), led by Woodside, have preferred either a floating platform or, more recently, back-filling an existing processing plant in Darwin. Australia, for its part, describes itself as “pipeline neutral”, but supports the decision of the commercial venture partners.</p>
<p>To address this issue, the SVP was invited to participate in the commission process. The report suggests very little progress has been made between the three parties – Australia, Timor-Leste and the SVP – on this dispute.</p>
<p>The commission considered two development concepts, based in Darwin and Timor Leste respectively. According to Gusmao, the pipeline to Timor-Leste is “non-negotiable”. Yet, there is little impartial evidence that this concept would be commercially viable.</p>
<p>In an effort to find a way out of the impasse, the commission employed an independent consultant from a London-based firm, Gaffney, Cline & Associates, to comparatively analyse the two development concepts. The specialist’s assessment, provided in Annexe 27 of the report, said that for a Timorese processing hub to achieve an acceptable return, the Timorese government or another funder would have to subsidise the project to the tune of US$5.6 billion. This is about four times Timor-Leste’s annual GDP, or more than one-third of its Petroleum Wealth Fund.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-03-06/east-timor-acuses-australia-of-collusion/9519530">A letter from Gusmao</a> leaked to the commission in February 2018 – after the last round of UNCC meetings – accused the commission of lacking impartiality, preferring the Darwin concept to the Timor-Leste concept. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/whats-behind-timor-leste-terminating-its-maritime-treaty-with-australia-71002">What's behind Timor-Leste terminating its maritime treaty with Australia</a>
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<p>The letter also rejected the comparative analysis provided by the independent expert. It accused the technical expert of not having the “appropriate experience or understanding from working in Timor-Leste” and of having failed to consider the socioeconomic development benefits of the Timorese proposal.</p>
<p>In contrast, the commission’s report noted that Gaffney, Cline & Associates had previously worked for Timor-Leste, but that Australia had not objected to the appointment.</p>
<p>The report suggests that the three parties – Australia, Timor-Leste and the SVP – are no closer to agreement on how to process Greater Sunrise gas.</p>
<h2>A looming threat to Timor-Leste’s development</h2>
<p>The need to resolve the development issue is increasingly urgent. Timor-Leste is rapidly running out of revenue and development options. Over 90% of its annual budget comes from revenues from oil fields that are <a href="https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/timor-sea-dispute-timor-leste-running-out-time">expected to be depleted</a> within the next five years. Economically, Timor-Leste does not appear to have a plan B if its strategy for bringing gas to the southern shores of Timor-Leste fails.</p>
<p>Given its precarious situation, one might wonder why Timor-Leste is taking what appears to be a risky approach to this issue, and about what kind of agreements it has sought with other actors or states. In any case, the central element of the Timor Sea dispute seems far from resolved. </p>
<p></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/95303/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Clive Schofield receives funding from the Australian Research Council. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rebecca Strating does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Despite a breakthrough on boundaries in the Timor Sea, the crucial question of how the shared oil and gas are to be developed remains unresolved.Rebecca Strating, Lecturer in Politics, La Trobe UniversityClive Schofield, Professor and Challenge Lead, Sustaining Coastal and Marine Zones, University of WollongongLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/962032018-05-10T20:41:12Z2018-05-10T20:41:12ZFor Timor-Leste, another election and hopes for an end to crippling deadlock<p>For the last year, the people of Timor-Leste have expected – and received – little from their government except deadlock. </p>
<p>From a political standpoint, there’s been gridlock for nearly a year after the Fretilin party eked out a victory in parliamentary elections last July, kicking independence hero Xanana Gusmao’s National Congress for Timorese Reconstruction (CNRT) party out of power for the first time in a decade. </p>
<p>However, Fretilin’s minority government found itself blocked at every turn by CNRT and its allies. It finally collapsed in December, forcing the beleaguered president to call for new elections, to be held on Saturday.</p>
<p>At the same time, there’s been economic deadlock, as well. The vast riches of the oil and gas fields in the Timor Sea have been locked away due to Timor-Leste’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/whats-behind-timor-lestes-approach-to-solving-the-timor-sea-dispute-57883">seemingly intractable negotiations</a> with the Australian government over a disputed maritime boundary. </p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/australia-should-help-east-timor-feed-itself-19830">Australia should help East Timor feed itself</a>
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<p>In March, <a href="https://theconversation.com/australia-and-timor-leste-settle-maritime-boundary-after-45-years-of-bickering-92834">a boundary treaty was finally signed</a> between the countries, which could lead to billions in royalties for Timor-Leste. But disagreements remain on how to develop the untapped Greater Sunrise basin that lies across this boundary. </p>
<p>In the past, Timor-Leste governments have focused on a “big development” economic strategy to exploit the country’s limited fossil fuels, which José Ramos Horta, the Noble Peace Prize laureate and former president and prime minister, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/07/australia-and-timor-leste-to-sign-deal-on-contentious-gasfield">has called</a> “an absolute necessity for the future well-being of this country”. </p>
<p>The recent political impasse has put serious discussions about the future of the country on hold. For starters, the tenor in the run-up to the election has been <a href="http://www.fundasaunmahein.org/2018/04/05/policies-over-personalities/">acrimonious and personal</a>, with the leaders of each party trading insults and playing up their contributions to the war of independence against Indonesia instead of debating policy. </p>
<p>Candidates have focused their campaigns on voting for the best “fatherly” figure of the revolution, with little regard for the country’s youth, <a href="http://www.thediliweekly.com/en/news/14925-unemployment-rates-increasing-annually">who suffer from high unemployment rates</a> and have largely been marginalised from the political process. </p>
<p>The economic development of the country, meanwhile, has been left out of the debate. The candidates all stress the need for “big resource development” and the need to build massively expensive gas processing infrastructure on the south coast of the country. But what’s lacking is any indication of whether gas can (or will) be developed in the long term by any multinational gas producer. </p>
<p>Also lacking is any real discussion about the future of the economy and how best to wean the country off its reliance on fossil fuels to drive economic growth. This has long been seen as a risky and unsustainable strategy. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.binzagr-institute.org/policy-report-102/">Based on my own research in the country</a>, as well as the work of other academics and development experts, the new Timor-Leste government will need to take a different strategy more in line with the [United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals], encouraging private investment and developing non-oil exports in agriculture, community forestry and coffee exports. Timor-Leste <a href="http://timor-leste.gov.tl/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/UNDP-Timor-Leste_SDP-Roadmap_doc_v2_English_220717.pdf">has committed itself to these SDGs</a>, even if it is struggling to meet them. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/from-violent-occupation-to-adventure-vacation-can-tourism-work-in-timor-8274">From violent occupation to adventure vacation – can tourism work in Timor?</a>
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<p>According to tradition, a sacred house in Timor-Leste is formed by four pillars. If two of those pillars are in a sloping position or broken, it will impact the house as a whole. When that happens, the elders will ask the young people to find new pillars to replace the ones that are damaged. </p>
<p>Timor-Leste now finds itself with two broken pillars – the leadership of the country and the dysfunctional parliament. The situation requires the attention of all Timorese to help fix the broken pillars and right the country. </p>
<p>The big question is whether the politicians who are elected on Saturday will listen to the people and bring an end to the deadlock holding the country back.</p>
<p><em>I would like to acknowledge the contribution made to my article by Victor Soares, Lecturer in Public Policy, Universidade Nacional Timor Lorosa’e (UNTL), Dili</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/96203/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jerry Courvisanos does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Timor-Leste’s vibrant democracy is seen as a bright light in a troubled region, but political instability could threaten the progress it has made.Jerry Courvisanos, Associate Professor of Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Federation University AustraliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/850972017-10-04T19:13:19Z2017-10-04T19:13:19ZPassion and pain: why secessionist movements rarely succeed<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/188695/original/file-20171004-12163-120qaih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Catalans protest the Spanish government crackdown after voting for independence.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters/Yves Herman</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Calls for “independence” have been increasingly heard on the streets of Barcelona in recent days. Those powerful emotions can drive people to extremes, which in some cases include killing and dying. Yet for the high price often paid, independence movements are rarely successful and their outcomes are usually less than hoped for.</p>
<p>Catalonia’s recent vote for independence provoked a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/oct/03/catalonia-holds-general-strike-protest-referendum-violence">heavy-handed response</a> from the government in Madrid. This has, in almost textbook style, conversely increased support for independence.</p>
<p>The Spanish government’s response was wrong if the intention was to secure Catalonia’s loyalty, but perhaps the right response if the intention was to shore up falling nationalist support elsewhere.</p>
<p>Independence movements commonly start with a small number of idealists, yet quickly grow when central governments respond with repression. In such circumstances, the desire for “freedom” takes root and flourishes. So the first responses of central governments to secessionist movements are critical to their outcome.</p>
<p>There are currently well over 100 secessionist movements, including four in the Philippines, dozens in India, around eight in Myanmar, and several dozen in Africa. Many of these have produced bloodshed and trauma well in excess of possible practical gains. Yet, despite their numbers, very few secessionist movements are ultimately successful, while the costs for governments imposing a nominal unity can be high for all involved.</p>
<p>With high risks and limited chances of success, secessionist movements are rarely about pragmatism and more about fervour. Even with popular support, these movements rarely have the political or military capacity to impose their will on the state from which they intend to secede. </p>
<p>Such limited examples of secessionist success that there are have relied on either external intervention – such as <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-16207201">Bangladesh</a> and <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/18/world/europe/18kosovo.html">Kosovo</a> – or agreement by a weakened parent state, such as <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-36358235">Eritrea</a> and <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2013/07/10/world/africa/south-sudan-fast-facts/index.html">South Sudan</a>. <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-pacific-14919009">Timor-Leste achieved independence</a> on the back of both factors.</p>
<p>Having overcome daunting odds of achieving independence, the success of post-secessionist states has, on balance, been poor. Bangladesh has struggled between periods of incapable civilian government, military coups and a state of emergency. Since independence in 1991, Eritrea has been an authoritarian one-party state with no political activity allowed.</p>
<p>Kosovo has been marked by divisive ethnic politics, while South Sudan has been wracked by ethno-political fighting since independence in 2011. Timor-Leste is a successful democracy, yet survived intact only due to international intervention ending civil conflict in 2006.</p>
<p>Of the world’s separatist movements, the most recent and notable, next to Catalonia, is <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/29/world/middleeast/kurds-independence-referendum-explainer.html">Kurdistan</a>. A Kurdish state would have a potentially sound oil-based economy and a very capable military.</p>
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<p><strong><em>Further reading: <a href="https://theconversation.com/catalans-and-kurds-have-a-long-battle-ahead-for-true-independence-85080">Catalans and Kurds have a long battle ahead for true independence</a></em></strong></p>
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<p>Yet even an independent Kurdistan would require access to trade routes to export oil. This is currently blocked by its parent state, Iraq, and suspicion or hostility from neighbouring Turkey, Syria and Iran. Kurdistan may continue to pursue independence, but it would likely have a more viable economic future as an autonomous state in a federated Iraq.</p>
<p>Even when successful, the cost of independence can be high. It can bring destructive wars, lack of economic activity and independence leaders failing to translate as wise politicians and capable administrators. The skills needed to win independence are not those required to rebuild and run a successful state.</p>
<p>So the record of successful secessionist movements is, overall, poor. The rhetoric of freedom and reward is more usually reflected in little of either.</p>
<p>Catalonia is luckier than most, having an experienced set of politicians and administrators. It also has, for now at least, an intact infrastructure and a vibrant economy. Its chances of success, should Madrid let it go, would be better than most.</p>
<p>Yet what is now more practically needed in Catalonia, and for most other secessionist movements, is a relatively high level of regional autonomy. Loosening the ties that bind can ease tensions and make states more stable, if in federated or similar form, rather than being tightly controlled and therefore resented.</p>
<p>Spanish President Mariano Rajoy’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/sep/20/spain-guardia-civil-raid-catalan-government-hq-referendum-row">threat to revoke Catalonia’s autonomy</a> is, therefore, precisely the wrong response for a leader wishing to quell secessionist demands. It was, after all, Spain’s Constitutional Court’s decision to restrict Catalonia’s existing autonomy that sparked the present calls for independence.</p>
<p>Spain’s governing People’s Party may strengthen its faltering support base by appealing to a wider nationalist sentiment in favour of state unity and imposing control over Catalonia. But imposed control will likely prompt further and more deeply entrenched separatist sentiment.</p>
<p>Given their vast differences, the fate of the handful of successful separatist movements cannot be used as indicators of an independent Catalonia’s future. But the drivers of separatism, and impediments to achieving independence, are shared.</p>
<p>Catalonia has been at the forefront of Spain’s domestic battles, and it could be that the current push for independence will spark another. Should it come to this, the cost of such conflict would exceed any possible benefits, for both Catalonia and for Spain.</p>
<p>The question, then, is how Spain’s national government and the Catalan independence movement can step back from a showdown. Failure to do so may mean the consequences become irretrievable.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/85097/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Damien Kingsbury is married to Timor-Leste’s Honorary Consul in Victoria, Rae Kingsbury. He was advisor to the Free Aceh Movement in the successful 2006 Helsinki peace talks, and has advised a number of other separatist movements.</span></em></p>Despite the passionate for which they are usually fought, independence movements are rarely successful and their outcomes less than hoped for.Damien Kingsbury, Professor, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Deakin UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/710022017-01-10T00:16:07Z2017-01-10T00:16:07ZWhat’s behind Timor-Leste terminating its maritime treaty with Australia<p>The government of Timor-Leste has officially <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/09/australia-and-timor-leste-to-negotiate-permanent-maritime-boundary">notified Australia</a> of its wish to terminate the 2006 Treaty on Certain Maritime Arrangements in the Timor Sea (CMATS). The treaty sets out the division of revenue from the <a href="https://theconversation.com/whats-behind-timor-lestes-approach-to-solving-the-timor-sea-dispute-57883">Greater Sunrise oil and gas fields</a>, an estimated A$40
billion deposit in the Timor Sea. </p>
<p>The maritime border between Timor-Leste and Australia has been a source of contention <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-you-need-to-know-about-timor-leste-and-australias-sea-border-fight-67377">over recent years</a>. But the decision to terminate the treaty and begin negotiations anew could have serious ramifications for Timor-Leste’s economic development, given its dependence on the Timor Sea resources. </p>
<h2>The CMATS treaty</h2>
<p>The CMATS treaty was designed to enable the <a href="https://industry.gov.au/resource/UpstreamPetroleum/Pages/JointPetroleumDevelopmentAreaandGreaterSunrise.aspx">joint exploitation</a> of the Greater Sunrise field. The treaty circumvented the competing border claims by placing a 50-year moratorium on negotiating maritime boundaries betweeen Australia and Timor-Leste. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/other/dfat/treaties/2007/11.html">Sunrise International Unitisation Agreement</a>, finalised in March 2003, agreed that 20.1% of Greater Sunrise was located in the Joint Petroleum Development Area (JDPA) established under the 2002 Timor Sea Treaty, and 79.9% within Australia’s jurisdiction.</p>
<h2>Scrapping the CMATS</h2>
<p>Timor-Leste has <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-you-need-to-know-about-timor-leste-and-australias-sea-border-fight-67377">long considered</a> this treaty invalid. In recent years, the governments of Timor-Leste and Australia have been <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-09-04/east-timor-offers-funds-for-onshore-gas-processing/4933106">unable to agree</a> on how the Greater Sunrise gas should be processed. </p>
<p>In 2013, Timor-Leste <a href="http://www.icj-cij.org/docket/index.php?p1=3&p2=1&case=156&code=tla&p3=0">initiated proceedings</a> against Australia at an arbitral court (in the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague) under the Timor Sea Treaty to invalidate CMATS. It did so on the grounds that Australia’s <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-11-25/east-timor-greater-sunrise-spy-scandal/6969830">alleged spying</a> on Timor-Leste’s negotiators in 2004 contravened the <a href="https://treaties.un.org/doc/Publication/UNTS/Volume%201155/volume-1155-I-18232-English.pdf">Treaty of Vienna</a> requirement that treaties be negotiated in “good faith”.</p>
<p>Timor-Leste <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-you-need-to-know-about-timor-leste-and-australias-sea-border-fight-67377">favours an export pipeline</a> to its south coast to enable its ambitious petroleum industrialisation plans. In contrast, Australia supported the <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2010-04-29/woodside-and-east-timor-disagree-over-gas-plant/416900">decision of the licensee consortium</a>, headed by Woodside, that the export pipeline was not the best commercial option. </p>
<p>When the CMATS treaty was negotiated, these disagreements were put aside in order to reach an agreement. However, this just delayed the seemingly irreconcilable dispute about developing the field. </p>
<h2>Sovereignty</h2>
<p>Timor-Leste’s government has <a href="https://theconversation.com/whats-behind-timor-lestes-approach-to-solving-the-timor-sea-dispute-57883">developed a narrative</a> that maritime boundaries are necessary for completing its sovereignty. This narrative has linked the independence movement to the sea disputes in order to bolster public support against Australia. Consequently, the moratorium on forming permanent boundaries had increasingly become a problem in relations between Australia and Timor-Leste. </p>
<p>In 2015, Timor-Leste’s government <a href="https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/timor-sea-dispute-timor-leste-running-out-time">initiated a United Nations Compulsory Conciliation</a> under Annex V of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) in a bid to pressure Australia into changing its policies on Greater Sunrise. </p>
<p>Timor-Leste’s withdrawal from CMATS is not a surprise. In the <a href="https://pcacases.com/web/sendAttach/1889">opening statements of the conciliation process</a>, Timor-Leste’s representatives flagged this as a likely action. </p>
<p>The careful wording of the joint statement makes it clear that the Australian government “recognises” Timor-Leste’s right to initiate the termination of the treaty. This does not suggest that Australia has substantially shifted its long-standing policies on the Timor Sea. However, the joint statement does indicate that the Australian government recognises that maintaining the CMATS treaty had become untenable. </p>
<h2>Future negotiations</h2>
<p>Terminating CMATS reflects a continuation of Timor-Leste’s high-stakes approach to Timor Sea diplomacy. </p>
<p>Negotiations on establishing a permanent maritime boundary will continue under the UN Compulsory Conciliation. This process is designed to help states resolve bilateral maritime disputes by providing recommendations from a panel of experts.</p>
<p>The Australian government has <a href="http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2016/09/27/australia-loses-bid-reject-compulsory-conciliation-timor-leste">repeatedly emphasised</a> the non-binding nature of these recommendations. While Australia has an obligation to negotiate in good faith, this does not mean it can be forced into agreeing to a maritime boundary. Negotiated boundaries still appear to be some way off. </p>
<p>Timor-Leste will be pushing for permanent maritime boundaries that will give Timor-Leste most, if not all, of Greater Sunrise in order to support its ambitious oil industrialisation plans. </p>
<p>Terminating the CMATS treaty ultimately means that the governments of Timor-Leste and Australia are back to square one in negotiations over Greater Sunrise. </p>
<h2>The consequences</h2>
<p>There are a number of potential consequences for Timor-Leste. </p>
<p>First, the revenues that flowed from the Joint Petroleum Development Area under the Timor Sea Treaty have provided approximately 90% of Timor-Leste’s state budget. The Bayu-Undan oil field <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/business/energy/conocophillips-mulls-major-offshore-gas-project-to-keep-darwin-lng-going-20150824-gj6utr.html">is expected to be depleted</a> by 2022 or 2023. </p>
<p>Without a source of revenue, Timor-Leste’s economy would be at serious risk of collapse: the A$16 billion petroleum fund <a href="http://country.eiu.com/article.aspx?articleid=523103836&Country=Timor-Leste&topic=Economy&subtopic=Forecast&subsubtopic=Fiscal+policy+outlook&u=1&pid=514689435&oid=514689435&uid=1">could be depleted by 2025</a>. The risk for Timor-Leste is that Australia will prolong boundary negotiations, putting more strain on its finances. Timor-Leste’s vulnerability increases as the window for resolving the dispute before oil revenues run out narrows. </p>
<p>Second, the Exclusive Economic Zone and continental shelf claims of Timor-Leste and Australia overlap with those of Indonesia. While the spectre of Indonesia’s future involvement in the dispute is largely ignored in the media, it would be naïve to believe that Indonesia would not become a third claimant if the opportunity arose.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/71002/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rebecca Strating does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A 2006 treaty governing the A$40 billion Greater Sunrise oil and gas fields has been a source of contention for a number of years.Rebecca Strating, Lecturer in Politics, La Trobe UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/673772016-10-31T07:46:14Z2016-10-31T07:46:14ZWhat you need to know about Timor-Leste and Australia’s sea border fight<p>With tensions in the East and South China Seas <a href="http://nationalinterest.org/feature/what-does-china-actually-want-the-south-china-sea-18211">dominating security concerns</a> in the Asia-Pacific region, little attention has been paid to the simmering maritime dispute between the tiny Southeast Asian state of Timor-Leste, also known as East Timor, and its much larger and wealthier southern neighbour, Australia. </p>
<p>The conflict – over the maritime border between the two countries across the Timor Sea – has considerable implications for Timor-Leste’s future security, and its viability as an independent sovereign state. </p>
<p>The resource-rich Timor Sea was thought to hold the key to the country’s economic development <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/pubs/rp/rp9899/99rp21">even before it became independent in 2002</a>. During its 1976-1999 occupation of the island nation, Indonesia negotiated with Australia to exploit Timor Sea resources. But they <a href="http://example.com/">disagreed on where the sea border</a> should be set between Timor-Leste and Australia.</p>
<p>In 1989, the two countries signed the <a href="http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/other/dfat/treaties/1991/9.html">Timor Gap Treaty</a>, which established a joint development zone and deferred the question of establishing a permanent maritime border. But Timor-Leste’s separation from Indonesia in October 1999 invalidated that treaty, and forced Australia to negotiate new arrangements with the country’s representatives.</p>
<p>On the very day of Timor-Leste’s independence on May 20 2002, Australian and Timorese representatives signed the <a href="http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/other/dfat/special/etimor/">Timor Sea Treaty</a>. This too deferred demarcating a permanent sea border. But, in recent years, Timor-Leste has sought to re-open negotiations with Australia.</p>
<h2>The dispute</h2>
<p>The Timor Sea is located between Australia’s northwest coast and the south coast of the island of Timor, a distance of less than 400 nautical miles. At the heart of the dispute is a contest over its oil and gas resources. </p>
<p>Both Australia and Timor-Leste claim an interest in the lucrative Greater Sunrise gas field, <a href="http://www.energynewsbulletin.net/storyView.asp?storyID=826950438&section=Liquified+Natural+Gas&sectionsource=s588036&aspdsc=yes">estimated to be worth US$40 billion</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/143846/original/image-20161031-15728-xv6hfv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/143846/original/image-20161031-15728-xv6hfv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/143846/original/image-20161031-15728-xv6hfv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=580&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/143846/original/image-20161031-15728-xv6hfv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=580&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/143846/original/image-20161031-15728-xv6hfv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=580&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/143846/original/image-20161031-15728-xv6hfv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=729&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/143846/original/image-20161031-15728-xv6hfv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=729&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/143846/original/image-20161031-15728-xv6hfv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=729&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The many possible and negotiated sea border options between Timor-Leste and Australia.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">DFAT</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The legal dimensions of the dispute concern where the countries’ sea borders should be drawn. Under international law, the <a href="http://www.un.org/depts/los/convention_agreements/texts/unclos/unclos_e.pdf">United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea</a> (UNCLOS) sets out principles for maritime boundary delimitation and dispute resolution.</p>
<p>But Timor-Leste cannot take its legal claims to an independent third-party arbitrator. Three months before the country became independent, <a href="http://www.icj-cij.org/jurisdiction/?p1=5&p2=1&p3=3&code=AU">Australia withdrew from compulsory jurisdictions</a> of international courts and tribunals on issues pertaining to maritime boundary delimitation. </p>
<p>Any permanent sea boundary would need to be negotiated between the two states. </p>
<h2>Competing claims</h2>
<p>Australia argues that the Timor Trough – a 3,500-metre trench 40 nautical miles from the coastline of Timor-Leste – divides two continent shelves. It <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/parliamentary_business/committees/house_of_representatives_committees?url=jfadt/timor_leste_2013/index.htm">claims that under principle</a> of “natural prolongation”, it possesses the seabed territory that extends to the edge of its continental shelf. </p>
<p>Delimitation drawn according to this principle would see the sea border drawn significantly closer to Timor-Leste than Australia. </p>
<p>But contemporary international law tends to support Timor-Leste’s claims that the boundary should be drawn in the middle of the sea between the two states. These <a href="http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/journals/AURELawJl/2005/60.pdf">claims rest on the principle</a> of “equidistance” under which a median border should be drawn between nations. If this boundary were adopted, the Joint Petroleum Development Area (JPDA) created by the Timor Sea Treaty would belong to Timor-Leste. </p>
<p>While the median line argument appears quite straightforward, the delimitation of the border is complicated by <a href="https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/east-timor-australia-and-timor-gap">legally ambiguous lateral boundaries</a>. </p>
<p>The eastern side of the boundary is integral to determining ownership of Sunrise. And an interim line, agreed to by Australia and Timor-Leste <a href="http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/other/dfat/treaties/2007/11.html?stem=0&synonyms=0&query=%20per%20cent22timor%20sea%20per%20cent22">in a 2003 agreement</a>, was drawn according to legal principles of equidistance. </p>
<p>If the matter were brought before an international court, Timor-Leste would need to prove why the line should be shifted east (“adjusted equidistance”) in order for it to gain possession of Sunrise.</p>
<h2>Failing treaty arrangements</h2>
<p>In 2006, Australia and Timor-Leste signed the <a href="http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/other/dfat/treaties/2007/12.html">Certain Treaty on Maritime Arrangements in the Timor Sea</a> (CMATS), which was designed to expedite the development of Sunrise. It too placed a moratorium on marking out a permanent sea border to get around the impasse in negotiations arising from overlapping territorial claims and differing interpretations of maritime law. </p>
<p>The CMATS also sought to put aside disagreements about how the gas would be processed. Timor-Leste favours an export pipeline to its south coast to enable its ambitious petroleum industrialisation plans. But <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2010-04-29/woodside-and-east-timor-disagree-over-gas-plant/416900">Australia supports the decision</a> of the licensee consortium, headed by Woodside, that the export pipeline is not the best commercial option.</p>
<p>Timor-Leste is now seeking to extricate itself from CMATS. And an <a href="http://www.icj-cij.org/docket/index.php?p1=3&p2=1&case=156">ongoing International Court of Justice proceeding</a> initiated by the country seeks to invalidate the treaty by arguing that <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/east-timor-takes-australia-to-un-over-sea-border-20160411-go39tl.html">Australia spied during CMATS negotiations</a> in 2004, violating the <a href="https://treaties.un.org/doc/Publication/UNTS/Volume%201155/volume-1155-I-18232-English.pdf">Treaty of Vienna requirement</a> that such agreements be negotiated “in good faith”.</p>
<h2>Timor-Leste’s oil dependence</h2>
<p>Timor-Leste has the option to withdraw from the CMATS, according to its provisions. But there are fears this would jeopardise the <a href="http://timor-leste.gov.tl/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/R_2003_2-Timor-Treaty.pdf">Timor Sea Treaty</a> and <a href="http://www.industry.gov.au/resource/UpstreamPetroleum/Pages/JointPetroleumDevelopmentAreaandGreaterSunrise.aspx">petroleum revenue from the JPDA</a>.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.eastasiaforum.org/2016/06/04/unravelling-timor-lestes-greater-sunrise-strategy/">This revenue provides</a> over 90% of the country’s budget and nearly 80% of its total GDP. But these fields are only expected to last until 2021. </p>
<p>Without an agreement on Sunrise, Timor-Leste will be left with very few sources of revenue outside of the petroleum sovereign wealth fund, which is worth US$16 billion but <a href="http://laohamutuk.blogspot.jp/2015/06/how-long-will-timor-lestes-petroleum.html">projected to run out in 2025</a>.</p>
<p>Even with oil and gas exports, Timor-Leste runs a significant current account deficit. Coffee, its next biggest export, <a href="https://www.austrade.gov.au/Australian/Export/Export-markets/Countries/East-Timor/Doing-business">comprises 90% of non-oil merchandise exports</a> but yields only <a href="http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/35878.htm">US$16 million a year</a>. </p>
<p>The country is also vulnerable to volatility in the global petroleum market: since 2014, revenue has decreased <a href="http://blogs.worldbank.org/eastasiapacific/timor-leste-manages-shock-falling-oil-prices">due to a plunge in world oil prices</a>. </p>
<p>In an effort to get a better deal on Sunrise, earlier this year Timor-Leste initiated <a href="https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/timor-sea-dispute-timor-leste-running-out-time">Compulsory Conciliation proceedings</a> under annex V of UNCLOS. The conciliation is designed to assist states resolve maritime disputes in bilateral negotiations by providing a report from a panel of experts with recommendations on how to proceed. </p>
<p>But this process doesn’t get around Timor-Leste’s problem that it cannot take Australia to court to set the sea border between the two countries. </p>
<h2>A security risk?</h2>
<p>While <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-09-27/court-of-arbitration-takes-up-australia-timor-sea-border-row/7879286">commentary in Australia</a> has tended to describe this as a court or arbitration, in reality the Commission can only provide non-binding recommendations. They are due in October 2017 – but the dispute doesn’t look like it will be resolved anytime soon.</p>
<p>A protracted fight with Australia over Sunrise runs <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-09-27/court-of-arbitration-takes-up-australia-timor-sea-border-row/7879286">counter to Timor-Leste’s security interests</a>. The “security-development nexus” suggests that the best way of enabling domestic security is to ensure development.</p>
<p>For around a decade, Timor-Leste has <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=ojQfVZ9r7oYC&printsec=frontcover&dq=fragile+peace+book&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjJ-7PZkoTQAhWCFZQKHZxvD90Q6AEIMzAB#v=onepage&q=fragile%20peace%20book&f=false">experienced a fragile peace</a>. Much progress has been made in its economic, social and political spheres toward development. But all this could be threatened if an agreement on Sunrise is not reached soon.</p>
<p>Without an alternative source of revenue, Timor-Leste could find itself reliant on foreign aid or international loans. Aid and loan conditions could undermine the capacity of Timorese governments to fulfil promises of political independence and implement long-term economic development ambitions, including increasing job opportunities for young people and developing an educated and trained workforce.</p>
<p>Even over the long term, gaining control of Sunrise will not deal with the country’s fundamental economic problem of oil dependence. This also constitutes a long-term security risk as Timor-Leste struggles to diversify its economy.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/67377/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rebecca Strating does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A conflict over the maritime border between the two countries has considerable implications for Timor-Leste’s future security, and its viability as an independent sovereign state.Rebecca Strating, Lecturer in Politics, La Trobe UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.