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1,900 East Timor's 'Orphans' yet to Return Home

In-depth Analysis
East Timor: The Millennium's Newest Nation

Working towards a solution
Appeal to the President Sukarnoputri

Important Links

(East Timor Children, Source:

(East Timor Refugee Camp: Large Numbers of Children were taken from refugee camps to Indonesia)
(Source: BBC News)

Most of the children living in various homes in Indonesia were separated from their parents during the 1999 elections held in East Timor. None have seen their parents for the past 4 or more years. Almost every family in East Timor was torn apart in the violence that accompanied the march to independence. After the vote, the Indonesian military and their militia proxies set about destroying East Timor. Hundreds of thousands of people fled or were forced over the border into West Timor. Many parents surrendered their children to people who promised to take care of them in Indonesia. They were told that, when the dust had settled, their children would be returned.

One such person was Hasan Basri. He told the residents of a small town in East Timor, Venelale, that he would protect their children, educate them, and feed them if they sent their children with him. The only requirement being that the children be converted from Catholics to Muslims. He assured the people of the town that they would be reunited with their children once things in East Timor were more peaceful and then the children could be converted back to Catholics. Many parents, like Jose Pareira, gave their children to him as their last resort to protect their children from the Indonesian military's brutalities.

Four years have passed. East Timor is peaceful and its people are getting on with the business of nation-building. Yet Pereira has not been reunited with his sons, Jacinto and Marito. Hasan refuses to let them go. He holds them, as he does about 50 others, in orphanages far from their birthplaces.

Johnny and Zakaraia, two other children brought from East Timor to Indonesia by Hasan Basri have not seen or met their parents since they left East Timor. They have no news whether their family is still alive or not. They study in schools in Western Java, sing the Indonesian National Anthem and know the Indonesian Flag but have no knowledge of what the East Timor Flag looks like. Both are not Catholics anymore.

Timor Hope Foundation, run by Octavio Soares, nephew of East Timor's former pro-integrationist governor Abilio Soares and an exiled East-Timorese who supported the territory's integration into Indonesia has at least 156 East Timorese children in it's custody.

There is a striking similarity in the attitude of Hasan Basri and Dr. Soares towards reuniting the 'orphans' with their families in East Timor. Both feel that they have the legal right to keep the children based on the documents signed by their parents. They refuse to let the children be reunited with their parents.

Human Rights experts mention that this is part of a large brainwashing operation of children from East Timor. Some speculate that Soares and Hasan want to bring up children who will oppose East Timorese independence. A source close to Octavio Soares was quoted saying. "there is a plan for East Timor to come back to Indonesia even if it takes 20 years or more and these children will help this cause."

Children interviewed in both these orphanages gave similar responses to questions. They only wanted to go home after they finish school and if they went earlier than that they wouldn't be smart.

Keeping children away from their parents, their family, their culture and their birthplace is not only illegal but also shameless. It is certain that orphanages such as the ones operated by Hasan Basri and Octavio Soares are not free of ulterior motives. Causing children to live like orphans when they have a home and a family to love them is utterly inhuman and unacceptable.

However, what is of utmost disgust is the apathy of the Government of Indonesia towards such orphanages. East Timor's Foreign Minister, Jose Ramos Horta, has described Indonesia's handling of the children's plight as "shocking and outrageous". If the Indonesian Government were more active in assisting the UNHCR and other humanitarian organizations in reuniting East Timorese children with their families, this problem would not have continued for so long.

In-Depth Analysis

East-Timor: The Millennium's Newest Nation

(East Timorese children still not back home)

The invasion, in the early hours of 7 December 1975, came in the form of a naval bombardment on Dili, followed by landings of paratroopers from the air and of marines on the beaches. Indonesian soldiers killed civilians indiscriminately in the streets of Dili, and after an incident when Indonesian soldiers fired on each other, indulged themselves in a rampage of rape, looting of Chinese shops and public executions on the wharf. On December 10, a second invasion resulted in the capture of the second biggest town, Baucau, and on Christmas Day another 10,000 -15,000 troops landed at Liquisa and Maubara, where further mass killings of civilians took place. By April 1976 Indonesia had some 35,000 soldiers in East Timor, with another 10,000 standing by in Indonesian West Timor.

The Indonesians, under the dictator Suharto, were in East Timor for nearly two-decades. A period that saw an outright abuse of human rights and international law. In spite of two resolutions passed in 1975 and 1976 demanding that Indonesia withdraw all it's forces from East Timor, the Indonesian military stayed and continued it's abuses. East Timor's resistance movement which erupted after the Indonesian invasion was violently suppressed by Indonesian military forces, and more than 200,000 Timorese were reported to have died from famine, disease, and fighting since the annexation.

Indonesia's human rights abuses finally began receiving international notice in the 1990s, and in 1996 two East Timorese activists, Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo and José Ramos-Horta, received the Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts to gain freedom peacefully for East Timor.The Indonesian government hotly criticized the decision. In 1997, Indonesia, including East Timor, was especially hard hit by the Asian economic crisis. Those troubles fed a brewing instability throughout Indonesia that finally resulted in President Suharto's 1998 resignation after 32 years at Indonesia's helm.

His successor, B. J. Habibie, unexpectedly announced his willingness to hold a referendum on East Timorese independence, reversing 25 years of Indonesian intransigence. As the referendum on self-rule drew closer, fighting between separatist guerrillas and pro-Indonesian paramilitary forces in East Timor intensified. The UN-sponsored referendum had to be rescheduled twice because of violence. On Aug. 30, 1999, 78.5% of the population voted to secede from Indonesia. In the days following the referendum, pro-Indonesian militias and Indonesian soldiers retaliated by razing towns, slaughtering civilians, and forcing a third of the population out of the province. After enormous international pressure, Indonesia finally agreed to allow UN forces into East Timor on Sept. 12. Led by Australia, an international peacekeeping force began restoring order to the ravaged region.

The UN Transitional Authority in East Timor (UNTAET) then governed the territory for nearly three years. A parliament was elected in 2001 and a constitution assembled, and on May 20, 2002, nationhood was declared. Charismatic rebel leader José Alexandre Gusmão, who was imprisoned by Indonesia from 1992 to 1999, was overwhelmingly elected the nation's first president on April 14, 2002. The president has a largely symbolic role; real power rests with the parliament and Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri, also a former guerrilla leader.

The first new country of the millennium, East Timor is also one of the world's poorest. Its meager infrastructure was destroyed by the Indonesian militias in 1999 and the economy, primarily made up of subsistence farming and fishing, is in shambles. As-of-yet-untapped off-shore gas and oil reserves, however, promise to bolster the economy in the next few years.

It's three years since the violence that accompanied East Timor's vote for independence. Then, thousands of men, women and children fled at gunpoint to the relative safety of West Timor and beyond. Now, most have returned to play their part in rebuilding East Timor. But some can't come home. They are mostly children, held by fanatical Indonesian nationalists still angry over the loss of the former province.

Efforts

Appeal Letter to the President Megawati Sukarnoputri

Write an Appeal Letter to the Indonesian President urging her to take a firm stand against the illegal detention of East Timorese children in Indonesia and cooperate with the UNHCR and the East Timorese government in reuniting the children with their families.

Important Links

NGOs

Timor Aid is a grassroots NGO working towards rebuilding East Timor (http://www.timoraid.org/index.htm)

Article References