Portal:Indonesia/Selected articles2/8

Indonesia occupied East Timor from December 1975 to October 1999. Originally a colony of Portugal, a 1974 coup led to decolonization. After a small-scale civil war, Indonesian military forces invaded in December 1975; by 1979 they had eliminated armed resistance to the occupation. Indonesia later included the territory as a province (flag pictured). For twenty-five years the people of East Timor were subjected to extrajudicial executions, torture, and starvation; a massacre in 1991 caused outrage around the world, and in 1996 the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo and José Ramos-Horta for their ongoing efforts to peacefully end the occupation. A 1999 vote to determine East Timor's future resulted in an overwhelming majority in favor of independence, and in 2002 East Timor became an independent nation. The occupation claimed between 102,800 and 183,000 East Timorese lives, out of a population of less than 700,000. (Read more...)