Evans ran into significant controversy on two major issues: relations with Indonesia over East Timor and French Nuclear Tests in the Pacific. Evans continues to be strongly criticised by many commentators – most prominently Noam Chomsky and John Pilger – for supporting Australia's recognition of Indonesian sovereignty over East Timor following its military invasion in 1975, negotiating (and celebrating 'replete with champagne') with then Indonesian Foreign Minister Ali Alatas the Timor Gap Treaty, and describing the 1991 Dili massacre as 'an aberration, not an act of state policy'. Evans has replied at length to these charges in various forums, acknowledging that the Indonesian military's behaviour had been appalling and conceding that Australia had been too optimistic about its capacity for redemption, but arguing, that de jure recognition by Australian (and other) governments had never denied the continuing right of the East Timorese to self-determination; that he personally had worked hard (as subsequently acknowledged by José Ramos-Horta) to achieve real autonomy for East Timor as the only realistic option before the events of 1997; and that independent East Timor had fully inherited the benefits of the Timor Gap Treaty.