The Situation in East Timor

Nikki Page and Lauren Blevins

The East Timor crisis, teeming with corruption and immeasurable violence, procures a crestfallen state, bereft of diplomacy and peace. The young state’s independence, declared from Portugal on November 28^th, 1975, was invaded by Indonesia nine days after. The land then became a part of Indonesia in July of 1976, as the province of Eat Timor. Over the next two decades, East Timor struggled for independence, during which an approximate 100,000 to 250,000 citizens lost their lives.

            In 1999, United Nations supervisors established a vote, in which East Timor was to become a sovereign entity. This was violently opposed by the Indonesians; they began a large-scale “scorched earth campaign,” in which approximately 14,000 people died, and thousands more were forced into refugee camps. Australian troops brought violence to an end on September 20^th, 1999.

            Indonesians relinquished East Timor, following United Nations action; independence was finally recognized for East Timor in May of 2002.

            East Timor contains the lowest GDP per capita of the world: $400. Its population is smaller than the population of Detroit: 947,000. The nation depends on fossil fuels as its staple resource. Its only export partner is Indonesia. Industrial production rate is 8.5%. Current president Xanana Gusmao and Prime Minister Jose Ramos Horta are activists in the establishment of a free, peaceful nation.

            In April of 2006, riots arose in Dili, due to unfair oil prices and allocations, in addition to 591 soldiers refused to return to their barracks; a rally demonstration took place, and elevated into a riot, in which 200,000 civilians fled their homes and five were killed.

            In June of 2006, president Gusmao requested that Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri to step down, on grounds of distribution military weapons and deceiving the public.

Committee Mission:

            The Security Council must now revisit the situation in East Timor to determine if further UN intervention is required to build a stable and democratic regime free of corruption.  It will recommend actions to be taken to reform the East Timor government and/or bring about a stable peace in the region.

The Conflict in Lebanon

The conflict started July 12 when the Hezbollah, a militant Islamic
group established to protect Lebanon from the Israelli invasion,
launched rockets across the Lebanense border, targetting many Israeli
border towns. They also staged an attack and three Israeli soldiers were
killed and two were kidnapped. Israel responded by imposing a blockade
and hitting several targets in southern Lebanon, they hit two airports
and a military air strip. Hezbollah reacted by firing rockets, and
damaging  the Israeli town of Haifa. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert
announced that in order for Israel to call a ceasefire, Hezbollah must
disarm, end its rocket attacks on Israeli civilians, and return the
kidnapped soldiers.  

Syria pledged its full support of Hezbollah and the Iranian president,
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad warned Israel not to attack Syria.

There were 45 killed and more than 100 wounded in southern Lebanon due
to Israeli airstrikes. the Israeli airstrike also killed 17 Hezbollah
militants. The UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and British Prime
Minister Tony Blair called for an international peacekeeping force. Only
two days after, four Israeli soldiers are killed and six wounded, the
United States gives Israel one week to rout out Hezbollah militants
before it will support a ceasefire. The Israeli army then called up its
reservists, preparing for possible ground offensive in Lebanon.

Soon after, the United States rushes delivery of precision bombs to
Israel and US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice rejects calls for
ceasefire, calling the violence in Lebanon "birth pangs of a new Middle
East."

 Three days later four UN observersare killed because of Isralli
airstrikes, an act Kofi Annan calls "apparently deliberate". UN Security
Council condemnation of the Israeli airstrike is vetoed by the United
States.

In Qana, Lebanon, over 50 Lebanese civilians and more than thirty
children killed  by Israeli air strike, igniting international outrage.
Israel announces a 48-hour cessation of air strikes, giving 24-hours for
Lebanese civilians to leave southern Lebanon through "humanitarian
corridors" to be coordinated by the UN. UN says it was not given enough
time to mobilize the effort. On August first, Israeli troops push across
border into Lebanon, killing 20 Hezbollah militants.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert gives several interviews to the
international press in which he affirms Israel's intention to cripple
Hezbollah, but welcomes the role of an international peacekeeping force
in the very near future and says Israel has no intention of broadening
the fight to the rest of Lebanon. While this is happening, Hezbollah
leader Hassan Nasrallah warns that Hezbollah will fire rockets at Tel
Aviv if Israel attacks Beirut, and an Iraqi Shia leader calls for a
"million man march" in support of Hezbollah.

Israel and Hezbollah agree to a UN-brokered ceasefire to go into effect
Monday, August 14, 2006. The ceasefire will provide for the release of
the two kidnapped Israeli soldiers and for a buffer zone in southern
Lebanon patrolled by Lebanese military and UN peacekeepers.

Committee Mission: