I do love a good conspiracy theory. Really I do. But it needs to at least appear to be more than a product of some partisan's imagination to capture my attention.

The gist of this one is that the East Timorese stabbed a couple of Indo soldiers, predicting soldiers would react by massacaring hundreds of Timorese, thereby capturing John Howard's bleeding heart, years before he was even opposition leader, leading to us making Indonesia have a referendum, which the Conspirators would rig in order to get oil money.

Whew! Damn brilliant, huh? The Protocols of the Elders of East Timor! And it all went according to plan!

C'mon you knuckleheads! Morris is surely taking the piss...

From Shirley Shackleton to the ignorant. The Balibo Five (as my husband and his colleagues are now called) were just doing their job.
And they did it so well that they were murdered by Indonesian military thugs and Timorese opportunist's on one of their regular hit and run attacks against the citizens of Portuguese Timor. The murders took place on 16th. October and the Indonesian invasion did not occur until 7th December. Indonesia has never admitted to the murders and as far as any Australain government is concerned, the Balibo Five do not exist.

I would have thought that Australian citizens (if the morons who blame the Balibo Five for their own deaths) would not approve of the murders if only for their own sakes.

So may lies have been told that even experts refer to them on a regular basis, but then so many books and articles have been published that it is not difficult to work out the truth of what happened to the much maligned Timorese. So go to it.

Rogingdon... yes, good points. The last 4 yrs.

Do you have any information more solid about the transmigrants ? Were they part of the large numbers who went to West Timor after the referendum ? I'd like to know more about this.

My gut feeling about how things have been going for the past 4 yrs is something like this. (based on the confessions of the 'hit' squad Alkatiri allegedly formed)

The government, or significant sections of it, would be simply manouvering for a more stable and solid level of control in this interim period between initial independance and the flow of cash from the oil.

-Get rid of potential enemies

They probably have long range plans in mind, to chanel funds to various resistance groups but who knows, I'm just speculating.

One thing is for sure, we can all clearly see the need for a 'big and powerful' controlling/stabilizing influence which is not linked ethnically to any one group in the country.

I again underline the importance for Australia of avoiding large concentrations of ethnically/religiously homogonous groups here, and for the same reasons.

The basic blending of our English/Irish/Welsh/Scottish and northern European races and the blurring of the ethnic boundaries has served us very well in producing and enjoying the peace we have now, not too many of us have a strong sense of "I'm a [name of ethnic group] Aussie"

When at a multicultural/mixed marraige get together last week, white dudes all called themselves 'Australians' and their ethnic wives called themselves 'Chinese' 'Philippino' etc I avoided the VERY tempting question of asking the wives 'what identity are your children :) maybe at the next Barby ...

Wisdom from today's letters to The Age.

http://www.theage.com.au/text/articles/2006/06/08/1149359880936.html

Elizabete Lim Gomes, Bentleigh

Boaz David
In response to your questions:
1. Any transmigrants Indonesia transplanted in East Timor would have most likely cast their vote for Autonomy. Since the overwhelming vote was for Independence, those people harbouring Indonesian sentiments and loyalties would have been amongst the flood of 'refugees' across the border to West Timor. Many pro-Indonesian militias still in East Timor were urged to own up to their 'crimes' during a truth and reconciliation exercise and in the spirit of reconciliation were forgiven.
Prior to the Indonesian invasion there were no East / West divisions but what ethnic rivalries that now exist are a legacy of Indonesian occupation which I believe have been encouraged by opposition elements to deliberately undermine unity. The Indonesian occupiers worked to create divisions amongst the East Timorese so as to sap Fretilin's loyalty base. Some East Timorese benefitted from the occupation and remember the difference of opinion about the Official language stems from the fact that Indonesians forced the teaching of Bahasa which current students were educated in.

2. Military deserter, Reinardo has been influenced by his military training in Australia and his non-participation in the guerilla struggle for independence. I understand he spent his adolescence as a servant of Indonesians and later lived comfortably with his family in Perth .
By any stretch of the imagination, his desertion was not acceptable and I believe he has been used as a foil for the unrest ,violence, escalating arson and criminal activity to deliberately unseat the Government.

Rogindon
Do you honestly expect the Alkatiri Government to perform miracles in 100 days from a position of utter devastation ? Alkatiri gave a comprehensive report of East Timor's progress in April this year to the Donor Country's Meeting where he made it clear that sustainable improvements would take time. The people doing the burning and looting are anti- government elements, do you expect Alkatiri to accept their manipulators as an alternative Government ?
Get real.

This article of Jim Morris reminds me the writings of those who deny the holocaust. Like Chomsky, who defended the right of Robert Faurisson to express his thoughts on the grounds of freedom of speech, I would say that Morris has the right to publish whatever he wants. But I disagree with Shirley Shackleton when she calls him ignorant. His article does not reveal his ignorance, it shows his bad faith. He may call himself a journalist, but is nothing more than a tool of those criminal Indonesian military allowed (until now) to enjoy impunity. Everyone who knows a little about East Timor will define this article as extreme-right rubbish.