My Take | East Timor’s tilt towards China exposes the West’s shameful history
- Given the brutal politics of the Cold War and Australia’s economic exploitation of its resources, it makes sense that the island nation wants closer relations with Beijing to serve as a counterweight
East Timor’s new President Jose Ramos-Horta has said time and again his country will not be dragged into the rivalry between China and the West. Still, the tiny nation, independent only since 2002, has tilted towards Beijing as it joins the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative.
Its people suffered immensely during the Cold War, under the brutal decades-long rule of Indonesia under Suharto, with the support of Washington and Canberra, and sometimes by their turning a blind eye. Even in the run-up to independence, Australian special forces soldiers in supposedly “humanitarian” operations, were accused of committing atrocities against civilians in 1999. The Australian military culture of impunity has been blamed by critics for paving the way to further war crimes committed in Afghanistan as part of the US-led occupation forces following the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
In February this year, the release, with more to come, of classified Australian cabinet documents from 2000, which detailed the plans of Australian oil and gas interests to carve up the crucial underwater resources off Timor-Leste, the official name of the island nation, have exposed the economic motive behind Australia’s deployment of “humanitarian” troops after the fall of Suharto in the wake of the Asian financial crisis.
Given the West’s brutally cynical history in East Timor, China actually has much cleaner hands. And if Washington and Canberra now complain about Beijing’s “debt traps” and neo-imperialism with the Pacific island nation, you should just roll your eyes.
How the reign of terror started