page_title: Indonesian occupation of East Timor
section_title: Australia
hierarchical_section_title: Indonesian occupation of East Timor / International response / Australia
caption_attribution_description: English: The Timor Sea, showing disputed exploitation zone the Timor Gap.
context_page_description: The Indonesian occupation of East Timor began in December 1975 and lasted until October 1999. After centuries of Portuguese colonial rule in East Timor, a 1974 coup in Portugal led to the decolonisation of its former colonies, creating instability in East Timor and leaving its future uncertain. After a small-scale civil war, the pro-independence Fretilin declared victory in the capital city of Dili and declared an independent East Timor on 28 November 1975.
  Claiming that its assistance had been requested by East Timorese leaders, Indonesian military forces invaded East Timor on 7 December 1975, and by 1979 they had all but destroyed the armed resistance to the occupation. Following a controversial "Popular Assembly" which many said was not a genuine act of self-determination, Indonesia declared the territory a province of Indonesia.
  Immediately after the invasion, the United Nations General Assembly and Security Council passed resolutions condemning Indonesia's actions in East Timor and calling for its immediate withdrawal from the territory.
context_section_description: In September 1974, Australian Prime Minister Gough Whitlam met with Suharto and indicated that he would support Indonesia if it annexed East Timor. On 11 November 1975, the Whitlam government was dismissed.
  This placed restrictions on the caretaker government of Fraser. Until the results of the 13 December election were known any action required approval from both political parties and the Governor-General. On 4 December 1975 Australia unsuccessfully sought a UN resolution to determine the independence of East Timor, the Australian Government evacuated Australians and other foreign nationals from Dili.
  José Ramos-Horta arrived in Darwin on 5 December saying that aid agencies the Australian Red Cross and Australian Society for Intercountry Aid Timor (ASIAT) had been banned from East Timor. In the same news conference Horta said that East Timor, Fretilin Government would not accept any UN assistance that included Australia.
  After winning the December elections, the Fraser government took the approach that trade with Southeast Asia and political ties with Southeast Asia were too important to be put at risk for what was seen as a lost cause. Australia abstained from the 1976 and 1977 UN General Assembly Resolutions, and by 1978 became the only government to recognise East Timor officially as a province of Indonesia.
  One year later, Australia and Indonesia began drafting a treaty to share resources in the Timor Gap. The treaty was signed in December 1989, with estimates ranging from one to seven billion barrels of oil to be secured. This agreement, along with general economic partnership with Indonesia, is frequently cited as a crucial factor for the Australian government's position. However, given that nearly 60,000 East Timorese had died during the fighting between Australian and Japanese forces that followed the invasion of Timor by the Japanese during the Pacific War, some Australians believed their government owed a special debt to the former Portuguese colony. James Dunn, a senior Foreign Affairs adviser to the Australian Parliament before and during the occupation, condemned the government's position, saying later: "What had been of vital strategic value in 1941 was, in 1974, irrelevant and dispensable." Some Australian World War II veterans protested the occupation for similar reasons.
  Successive Australian governments saw good relations and stability in Indonesia (Australia's largest neighbour) as providing an important security buffer to Australia's north, but the East Timor issue complicated co-operation between the two nations. Australia provided important sanctuary to East Timorese independence advocates like José Ramos-Horta (who based himself in Australia during his exile).
  Australia's trade with Indonesia grew through the 1980s, and the Keating Labor Government signed a security pact with Indonesia in 1995 and gave relations with Jakarta a high priority. The fall of Indonesian President Suharto and a shift in Australian policy by the Howard Government in 1998 helped precipitate a proposal for a referendum on the question of independence for East Timor. In late 1998, Prime Minister John Howard and Foreign Minister Alexander Downer drafted a letter to Indonesia setting out a change in Australian policy, suggesting that East Timor be given a chance to vote on independence within a decade.
  The letter upset Indonesian President B. J. Habibie, who saw it as implying Indonesia was a "colonial power" and he decided to announce a snap referendum. A UN-sponsored referendum held in 1999 showed overwhelming approval for independence but was followed by violent clashes and a security crisis, instigated by the anti-independence militia. Australia then led a United Nations-backed International Force for East Timor to end the violence, and order was restored. While the intervention was ultimately successful, Australian-Indonesian relations would take several years to recover.
  The Australian Labor Party altered its East Timor policy in 1999 and adopted a policy of support for East Timorese independence and opposition to the In
caption: Soon after recognising the annexation of East Timor in 1978, Australia began negotiations with Indonesia to divide resources found in the Timor Gap.
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