EAST TIMOR: TOWARDS PEACE, PROSPERITY AND SELF-DETERMINATION

ITF's first season of ecoversity forums, September 23 to December 17, 1992, presented in association with the Human Rights Office of the Australian Council for Overseas Aid, the Timor Talks Campaign, the Australian Conservation Foundation, the Timorese UN Project and the East Timorese community of Victoria, organised at a time of extreme human rights violations in East Timor.

Presentations were in four languages: Tetum, Hakka, Portuguese and English. Speakers were introduced by the young East Timorese refugees who participated in the youth ambassadors training program facilitated by Imagine The Future with the Timorese community. Two of these Melbourne-based youth ambassadors later participated in a tour of North America organised through the Ecoversity in 1993, which followed ITF coordinator, Merrill Findlay's visit to New York in August, 1991, to petition the UN Special Committee on Decolonisation on behalf of ACFOA, the East Timorese community and other groups.

1. September 24 1992
HISTORY & CULTURE: WHO ARE WE, THE PEOPLE FROM EAST TIMOR?
with anthropologist Patsy Thatcher; interpreter and activist Salustiano Freitas; community cultural historian Jose Barbosa; 'story teller in residence' Berta Santos; Matias Gonsalves who recently visited his home village after 17 years; and co-facilitators of this series, Abel Guterres and Emilia Pires.

2. October 1 1992
COLONIALISM AND RESISTANCE: THE LAST 400 YEARS
with Agio Pereira, executive director of the East Timor Relief Association, spokesperson for CNRM (National Council of Maubere Resistance) and editor of Matabian News; student activist and writer, Jose Kao Tai Casimiro; activist and former resistance fighter Francisco Pangchi Kong; and 'story teller in residence' Berta Santos.

3. October 8 1992
INDONESIA: KNOW THY NEIGHBOUR
with Pat Walsh, director of the Human Rights Office of the Australian Council for Overseas Aid and editor of Inside Indonesia; anthropologists Ron Hatly and Leah Jellinick; Indonesian born student activist Vanessa Hearman; trade analyst Rowan McClean; East Timorese refugee Alarico Sena talking about student activism in Java; and Indonesian student dissident Helme F. talking about the democracy movement in Indonesia.

4. October 15 1992
THE INVASION: WHAT HAPPENED AND WHY DIDN'T THE WORLD CARE?
with foundation director of Community Aid Abroad David Scott who was in the last party of Australians evacuated from Dili five days before the full-scale Indonesian assault on December 7, 1975; Cliff Morris, a member of the 2/4th Australian Commando Squadron of the Australian Imperial Forces talking about the Japanese invasion and the bombing of Dili by the Allies during WWII; resistance fighter and leader of the Chinese Timorese community, Konneng Lay; and refugee Berta Santos talking about surviving the Indonesian invasion and the famine that followed.

5. October 22 1992
WHAT IS SELF-DETERMINATION?
with anthropologist Monsignor Hilton Deakin talking about self-determination as a cultural right; human rights lawyer Nicola Seaman; international lawyer and advocate Gerrie Simpson from the Law Department, Melbourne University; and community development activist Robert Wood.

6. October 29 1992
WHAT ARE HUMAN RIGHTS, SOCIAL JUSTICE AND ECOLOGICAL SUSTAINABILITY? AND WHAT DO THEY MEAN FOR EAST TIMOR?
with Pat Walsh, director of the Human Rights Office of the Australian Council for Overseas Aid; environmentalist Karen Alexander from the Australian Conservation Foundation; Bill Armstrong, director of the Overseas Service Bureau; and Bob Munz from Community Aid Abroad who witnessed the Santa Cruz massacre on 12 November 1991.

7. November 5 1992
WHAT ABOUT THE UNITED NATIONS?
with Tony Gelme, executive director of the United Nations Association (Victoria); East Timorese activist and chairperson of the East Timorese Association in Victoria, Emilia Pires talking about the UN Human Rights Commission; and scholar Helen Hill from the University of Victoria talking about decolonisation. With a special screening of Buried Alive: the story of East Timor, by Gil Scrine, Fabio Cavadini and Ron Hibberd.

8. November 19 1992
LIBERATION STRUGGLES AND NATIONAL SOVEREIGNTY: EAST TIMOR IS NOT ALONE
with prominent Indonesianist Herb Feith, Politics Department, Monash University, talking about new forms of sovereignty; refugee Justino Guteres, former deputy director of communication responsible to the Cabinet of the short lived Republic of East Timor; and Peter Mares, presenter of the ABC radio program Indian Pacific talking about regional challenges.

9. November 26, 1992
FOREIGN POLICIES AND EAST TIMOR: WHO'S DOING WHAT TO WHOM AND WHY?
with political analyst Jim Dunn, former Australian consul to East Timor and international diplomat who returned to Timor in 1975 as leader of the Australian Council for Overseas Aid relief team, and author of Timor: a people betrayed (Jacaranda Press 1983); New Zealand Member of Parliament Jim Anderton; scholar Richard Tanter from the Australia Centre at Melbourne University; MP Andrew Theophanous talking about Australia's relationship with Indonesia; and Joe Camilleri, from the Political Science, Department, La Trobe University. Joe's books include Civilisation in crisis (Cambridge University Press New York 1976) and with Jim Falk, The End of Sovereignty: the politics of a shrinking and fragmenting world ( Edward Elgar, UK 19 92).

10. December 3 1992
NEGOTIATING A JUST PEACE
This forum was a mock UN hosted round of negotiations between Indonesia and East Timorese representatives. Pat Walsh from ACFOA's Human Rights Office played the UN General Secretary, and Monash University scholar David Bouchier played the Indonesian military, with East Timorese youth ambassadors Danilo Henriques, Luis Santos and Victor Guterres negotiating the future of East Timor, with advice from Fretilin representative Abel Guterres and members of the audience.

An exhibition of works on paper by Australian artist Jeff Stewart, Night visions: images from a tourist in East Timor, launched in Portuguese at this forum by East Timorese elder Alfredo Pires.

 

11. December 10 1992
DEVELOPMENT: MAKING IT SOCIALLY, ECONOMICALLY AND ECOLOGICALLY SUSTAINABLE
with Janet Hunt, executive director of the International Women's Development Association; Jason Alexandra, sustainable land use campaigner,Australian Conservation Foundation; and engineer Geoff Lacey talking about appropriate technology.

12. December 1992 17
EAST TIMOR IN THE YEAR 2020: WHAT CAN IT BE LIKE AND HOW DO WE GET THERE?
The East Timorese youth ambassadors take the floor to explore their hopes for East Timor through role play, led by 'President' Elizabeth Exposto.

These events were facilitated by Merrill Findlay and ITF's administrator, Catherine Brookes, with Emilia Pires and Abel Guterres.

Re-posted March 2004.