New anxiety in East Timor

December 7, 2005

True peace with Indonesia will be hard while its military harbours resentment, writes James Dunn.

THE 30th anniversary of the invasion of Dili by a large Indonesian force, is a time for sober reflection in Australia as well as in East Timor. While the invasion began earlier with the Balibo attack, it was the assault on Dili that captured world attention, an operation that claimed an estimated 200,000 Timorese lives in the following years.
Remarkably, relations between East Timor and Indonesia have blossomed since President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono came to office last year, aided by the enthusiastic, even indulgent, efforts of the Timorese leaders. They have taken the extraordinary step of moving to bury the bloody events during those 24 nightmarish years of Indonesian occupation, a move helped by the bleak prospect of gaining international support for an appropriate tribunal.

A sensitive testing of the state of the relationship is the situation at East Timor's border, whose porous nature has for decades led to disputes. It traverses mountainous terrain, at times following river courses that can change after monsoonal rains. No less complex is the border around the enclave of Oecussi, the scene of a serious incident.

In April this year, to mark his visit to Dili, Yudhoyono signed an agreement which settled the demarcation of most of the border, but the installation of the necessary markers is still incomplete. Despite the new atmosphere of
goodwill, border incidents, occasionally involving militia elements still active in West Timor, continue to occur, with some reports suggesting the new nation's security is at risk. That is rather alarmist, but there are signs that this goodwill may not be fully endorsed by those TNI (Indonesian military) officers who harbour a brooding resentment at their humiliating and ignominious departure from East Timor in 1999. Some elements of the Indonesian military are apparently not averse to giving tacit support to militia remnants, mainly those loyal to Joao Tavares and Eurico Guterres.

The recent incidents are much rarer and less serious than the clashes during the UN mandate, but there have been several worrying incidents this year. While they have been relatively minor, and more to do with smuggling than militia intrusion, there is evidence of either TNI involvement, or at least tolerance of these incursions.

The four border incidents this year may have been minor, but they have provoked anxiety among the Timorese. The first occurred only three weeks after Yudhoyono signed the agreement in April. A TNI officer was accidentally wounded by Timorese guards during a pursuit of smugglers. The Indonesian military responded with outrage, temporarily suspending contacts. A more serious incident, however, occurred in October at Oecussi, when more
than 100 Indonesians, allegedly encouraged by army troops, crossed the border and attacked Timorese police. It caused anger and apprehension in Dili, with calls for a Timorese withdrawal from the Truth and Reconciliation
Commission, which is yet to prove its worth.

As it turned out, tempers cooled quickly, thanks to prompt crisis management by the President of East Timor, Xanana Gusmao, its Foreign Minister, Jose Ramos Horta, and Indonesian officials. Responses from the Indonesian military, on the other hand, have been less conciliatory. The posting to border areas of two units, notorious for their human rights abuses in 1999, was at best insensitive. The first, 744 Battalion, was formed back in 1976 by then Major Yunus Yosfiah, the officer who ordered the Balibo executions. The second, 745 Battalion, left a trail of murder and destruction when it withdrew in 1999. Placing its troops near Oecussi was a particularly insensitive action, because in 1999 its troops were responsible for a massacre at Passabe, where 85 unarmed, and randomly selected, young Timorese were murdered.

Although Yudhoyono's commitment to a full reconciliation with East Timor is not in question, what is uncertain is his capacity to prevent sections of a largely unreformed military from pursuing its own opportunistic agenda. With
memories of those massive border violations 30 years ago, many East Timorese will not relax until the Indonesian military's brutal past in East Timor has been fully exposed, by whatever means, to Indonesia's new political establishment and the world.

James Dunn is an East Timor and Indonesia specialist, and was a 2000-2001 UNTAET expert on crimes against humanity in East Timor.

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