AUT: EASTTIMOR/INDONESIA

[bernhard@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (be)]

All the World is calling for a military intervention of
an international "Peacekeeping-Force" in Easttimor - like
all mainstream-media have called for the war against the
people in Yugoslavia. The outbreak of violence in
Easttimor was predictable and all parties involved - UN,
the Indonesian military forces and Fretilin - were
looking forward for it.
The pattern of pre-war-situation is mostly the same as it
was before the war in Yugoslavia - with a major
difference: The Fretilin has the image of a "leftist"
"liberation" movement. But nationalism is not "left" or
"right": it kills.
The following article was written in May. It may be
useful as background information. We are working on an
update.

http://www.rhein-neckar.de/~wildcat/easttim.html
(German version:
http://www.rhein-neckar.de/~wildcat/osttim.html)

Indonesia/ East Timor: the next 'hot-spot'
"NATO does not prevent violations of  human rights. They
supported the Turkish torture-regime with arms-deliveries
in their crimes against the population in Kurdistan. They
also provided arms to the Indonesian regime, which
slaughtered tens of thousands in East-Timor. In these and
other cases, they shit on human rights." That is, unless
such ostensible support fits into their plans. It seems
that the particularly critical situation in East Timor
could rapidly become the "humanitarian" pretext, a lever
for the situation in Indonesia, a situation which is
unacceptable for global capital.
A few weeks ago, a delegation of all German parliamentary
parties visiting Indonesia warned that East Timor was the
likely next hot-spot and demanded, alongside the East
Timor solidarity movement and the representatives of the
national liberation movement in East Timor, the
dispatching of an armed "international peace force."
East Timor: a long forgotten tragedy
East Timor was once a colony of Portugal, dismissed quite
suddenly into independence after Portugal's  "carnation
revolution" of 1974. Shortly after, a bloody civil war
broke out between the UDT and the Fretilin, two parties
which had previously spoken up for independence. One
reason for this civil war, among others, was that this
conflict was pre-ordained by the maneuverings and plans
of the Indonesian Government.
In 1975 the Indonesian army marched into East Timor. In
1976, East Timor was formally annexed   a move which was
never recognized by the UN. Since then, East Timor has
been listed as "territory without its own government".
Portugal is regarded as its diplomatic representative in
international fora. 200, 000 people died as a result of
the invasion by Indonesia: killed, starved, or dead as a
result of treatable and minor illnesses. That is, 200,000
out of, at the time, a population of approximately
800,000.
East Timor always was a poor country. Portugal had shown
no particular commitment to its "development." For
example, in 1975 there was just 20km asphalted road in
East Timor.Agriculture consisted mostly of subsistence
farming.  During the first phase of the fight against the
Indonesian army, this fact quickly became a hunger-trap
for the population. Through the destruction of forests,
the theft of livestock and the ejection of people from
the land on a huge scale, the first wave of
proletarianisation was achieved within a particularly
short time. Despite many state measures (e.g. on
infrastructure), East Timor however remains largely
non-industrialised. Infringements by the Indonesian army
have occurred again and again, including regular
massacres. Most prominently, more than 200 people were
shot during a funeral in Dili in 1991.
The majority of the population in East Timor is Catholic.
However, this has been the case only since the annexation
to Indonesia. Indonesia requires affiliation to one of
the five state-recognized religions. Many of those living
in East Timor are migrants from different parts of
Indonesia. A few of them through the framework of the
official transmigration programs, most in the wake of the
former or spontaneously. For some there have been
distinct benefits, in particular from the fact that
land-titles had been changed, to the disadvantage of the
old-established and in favour of a by-now inflated state
administration.  It is unclear exactly how many
transmigrants there are.  Estimates range up to 200.000,
hence more than 20% of the population. Whereas migrants
from Sulawesi and Java are Moslems, and have their roots
in a culture and history distinct from that of East
Timor, migrants from West Timor are culturally quite
close to the East Timorese, many of them speaking Tetun,
the predominant indigenous language. However, they don't
know Portuguese and on average speak better Bahasa
Indonesia. Between the older-established population and
some migrants, there were often bloody confrontations. In
September 1995, 1,000 people fled out of East Timor after
markets and mosques were burnt.
The invasion by the Indonesian army took place one day
after a meeting between Soeharto with the-then US
president, Ford. For the subsequent twenty years, there
were many UN-resolutions (the USA regularly abstained
from voting), but in reality no state, other than
Portugal, was concerned about the fate of East Timor. In
the second half of the 'nineties, this slowly began to
change, indicated most prominently with the co-awarding
of the Nobel Peace Prize to the representative of the
pope in East Timor and to Jose Ramos Horta (co-founder of
the Fretilin and their representative at the UN).  That
this occurred in 1996 was no arbitrary matter. There were
distinct and decisive reasons for this timing.  Indonesia
was one of the most prominent so-called 'Asian tigers'.
In 1996 there emerged the  prospect of an end to the
Soeharto era. The occupation of East Timor was deemed
okay, as long as everything remained, seemingly perhaps,
in the grip of a strong military-dictatorship. Once
again, it was discovered, when it became plainly evident,
that a change in the political situation in the
third-largest country in the world was inevitable.

The "hot-spot"
...therefore, is obviously not East Timor, but Indonesia.
Indonesia is not Yugoslavia, but there are so many
parallels that a similar development seems possible. This
is substantiated by the current situation, which is
getting worse not only in East Timor, but in the whole of
Indonesia. Indonesia is a multi-ethnic state, there is no
ethnic majority. Meanwhile, Indonesia is an
industrialized country, the population is mostly
proletarian. It has also been the worst hit by the
so-called 'Asian Crisis'. Whereas in South Korea, initial
trends of 'recovery' are noticeable, and whilst Thailand
remains ledgered on a "black zero", in Indonesia there
are still no indications of improvement. The reasons are
simple.  The potential for exploitation in Indonesia is
immense. Today, wages in Indonesia are perhaps the lowest
in the world. However, the investment risk is enormous:
Indonesian society as a whole, and in particular the
working class, refuses many of the conditions demanded by
global capital. To put it another way, the workers are
cheap indeed, but not sufficiently motivated or
subordinated.  Every day, there are strikes,
demonstrations, reclamations of land and other struggles,
despite (or rather, because of) massively high
unemployment and poverty. Over half of the population now
lives below the World Bank's index of poverty.  Moreover,
in almost all parts of the country, the other side of
pauperization is evident. Acts of proletarian
self-slaughtering, located and justified along the lines
of ethnicity and religion, or between old-established
populations and  immigrants or, in some cases, massacres
of inhabitants of neighboring villages for reasons which
seem to elude outsiders.
The social and political situation in Indonesia is
explosive.  Small explosions occur every day. It is not
entirely clear why the Habibie Government proposed a
statute of autonomy for East Timor in August last year.
At the beginning of 1998, alongside a radicalised student
movement in Indonesia, there occurred a corresponding
surge in the movement in East Timor, most distinctly in
June and July that, among other things, resulted into the
flight of tens of thousands of migrants out of East
Timor.  Most likely, the main reason for Habibie's
decision was his weak domestic authority, thus
attempting, through the decision on the autonomy
proposal, a winning maneuver in foreign policy.  It is
also likely that he simply wanted to get rid of a furnace
of unrest, over and above a relatively uninteresting one
(in an economic sense). There are also liberation
movements in Aceh (North Sumatra) and in Irian Jaya (West
Papua), and bloody confrontations between these and the
military are once again flaring up.  Yet both regions are
rich in oil (Aceh) or other mineral resources which
deliver large revenues.
The offer of autonomy inside the Indonesian state,
however, did not lessen the independence movement in East
Timor.  From January 1999, there were negotiations with
the UN and Portugal, while simultaneously Pro-Indonesian
militias - partly-equipped and graciously permitted
through the military or  military ties - began to spread
fear and panics.  They have attacked villages and
buildings to which people have fled, including even
churches. They parade armed throughout  Dili, unhindered
by the police or military. They have targeted the homes
of militants of the movement for  independence and
distributed leaflets announcing death-threats.
Altogether, more than a hundred people have been
assassinated by these militia so far this year.
On May 5, Indonesia signed an agreement with Portugal and
the UN over the statute of autonomy and the preparation
for and conduct of a ballot of the East Timorese by the
UN (in effect, a referendum to be held on August 7th or
8th) on the future of East Timor: autonomy in Indonesia
or independence. Whereas parts of the population in East
Timor remain terrorized, the leaders of the
"liberation" organisations have mutated to statesmen,
following the enormous boost to their standing through
the negotiations. Xanana Gusmao, head of Falintil (the
armed section of the Fretilin) and president of the CNRT
(Conselho National de Resistancia Timorese), still in
jail in Jakarta, has prohibited the students in Dili from
organising demonstrations against the terror of the
militias: "We thus must all contribute to this process
[the preparation of the poll] following the orientations
of the UN team. To this end, I reiterate my appeal to all
to remain calm. I reiterate my appeal to the youths of
Dili to obey orders and demand that they act responsibly
and with discipline."
Instead of placing the future of East Timor in the hands
of the "youth of Dili" he and other 'leaders' hope for a
future as statesmen with a state of their own, and
demands the dispatching of armed peace-keepers to East
Timor. They don't even baulk at openly demanding an
invasion by NATO.  Jose Ramos Horta, in an interview with
The Gazette, a provincial newspaper in Iowa, said: "The
NATO intervention would be the first one in 50 years that
can be argued is on purely humanitarian grounds". The
article continues: "Ramos-Horta said he wished the United
States or other NATO members would give his home nation
of some 800,000 people the same kind of help they are
giving Kosovo." The Prime Minister of Portugal, Antonio
Guiterres, responded: The participation of Portugal in
the NATO actions in Bosnia and Yugoslavia give the
country the "ethical authority" to demand the
intervention of the UN into East Timor.
The UN will send around a few hundred, unarmed police
officers, who will advise and support the Indonesian
security forces in the preparation of the referendum and
the maintenance of security. This is certainly a - even
perhaps a consciously - gamble.  Everyone with an
inclination will be capable of an attack on an unarmed
group and there are enough with an inclination -- from
the pro-Indonesian militias, who want to prevent the
referendum, to sections of the military, to whom an armed
confrontation with 'foreign aggressors' would be a
pretext to organizing, for example, a coup and the
enforcement of  martial law in the country.
What remains unclear is the role and destiny of
immigrants in East Timor. In the agreement on the statute
of autonomy, those recognised as East Timorese citizens
are those who have lived there prior to 1975 or have
lived there for 5 years or longer.  On the other hand, in
the agreement on the referendum only those who were born
there or who have parents or grandparents or a spouse who
were born there are recognised as citizens. That is
effectively an ethnic definition, which includes the
exiled Timorese, but excludes immigrants.  This might be
the precondition of ethnic cleansings.  Furthermore, the
validity of such agreements rest on their adoption by the
Indonesian parliament   which, practically speaking,
could occur only after the ballot, since the new
parliament does not assemble before August (supposing
that the elections will be moderately successful, which
is far from certain at the time of the writing this
article, one week before the elections).  Currently,
almost all parties, including the PDI Perjuangan headed
by Megawati, are still against the independence of East
Timor.
Finally, we can perhaps find the biggest occasion for war
in an agreement between Australia and Indonesia over the
exploitation of a newly-discovered and huge oil field
between East Timor and Australia.  This treaty between
Indonesia and Australia was signed under the protest of
Portugal.  Australia only recently built up a rapid task
force stationed in Darwin, the closest point in Australia
to East Timor.

Down with the humanitarian war-mongers!
Formerly wars were 'just wars', nowadays they are 'for
humanity'.  This means that any occasion can become the
pretext. The situation in Indonesia delivers these
justifications en masse.  Furthermore, the radical
state-humanists no longer hesitate.   From the Indonesia/
East Timor solidarity movement to the rebel-leaders now
chastened into statesmen, right through to the German PDS
(left-wing party; formerly SED), they all demand war now.
There are no exceptions left.   Everybody now demands
"armed peace-keepers", from the USA, from the German
Federal Government or from whomever else demands the
preparation and conducting of a war in Indonesia, which
will be led together with the reactionary powers in
Indonesia against the working class. Whether global
capital and its armed troops submit to this requirement
is still today certainly speculation. But if the Balkan
crisis can be solved with bombs, why not the Asian
crisis?
Karl Eugen, May 31, 1999 (from:Wildcat Zirkular, # 50)

 WELT IN UMWAeLZUNG (World in Transformation)
Mannheim-Ludwigshafen, Germany
bernhard@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx



     --- from list aut-op-sy@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ---