Portal:Oceania/Selected article/June, 2010
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Indonesia occupied East Timor from December 1975 to October 1999. After centuries of Portuguese colonial rule in East Timor, a 1974 coup in Portugal led to decolonization among its former colonies, creating instability in East Timor and leaving its future uncertain. After a small-scale civil war, the pro-independence FRETILIN declared an independent East Timor on 28 November 1975. Claiming its assistance had been requested by East Timorese leaders, Indonesian military forces invaded on 7 December.
Following a controversial "Popular Assembly", Indonesia declared the territory a province of Indonesia. For twenty-five years East Timor was subjected to extrajudicial executions, torture, and starvation. The 1991 Santa Cruz Massacre caused outrage around the world, and reports of other such killings were numerous. Resistance to Indonesian rule remained strong; in 1996 the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to two men from East Timor, 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 is estimated to have claimed between 100,000 and 300,000 East Timorese lives, out of a population of less than a million.