Timor-Leste which
won independence from Indonesia
in 1999 is now engaged in a new economic independence struggle with Australia over rights to oil and gas reserves in
the Timor Sea . In March, more than ten thousand East Timorese led by the
Movimentu Kontra Okupasaun Tasi Timor (MKOTT or the movement against occupation
in the Timor Sea) held a two-day peaceful protest in front of the Australian
Embassy in Dili demanding a re-negotiation of the maritime borders of the oil-
and gas rich Timorese sea. While some would like to say the protests were
orchestrated by the Timorese Government, there should be no doubt that these
protests grew out of the strong sentiment held by the Timorese and it was
neither government led, nor government incited. The forceful, yet peaceful,
protests were organised by Timorese civil society. The Timorese know themselves
what is right and wrong.
“We
fought a long struggle for 24 years for our independence and for sovereignty
over our land, now we are in a new struggle to secure sovereign rights over our
seas,” former prime minister, Xanana Gusmao told journalists.
Agio
Pereira is the Minister of State, Timor Leste's second most important Cabinet
position after the Prime Minister made
the case that Australia was behaving like China in its approach to the
domination of the South China Sea "I think Australia cannot go on
lecturing other countries about respecting international law in the limitation
of maritime boundaries, and yet look the other way in its closest neighbour,
Timor Leste."
Australia’s
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, with an eye on China’s territorial aggression
in the South China Sea, had urged other countries to abide by international law
and called on the Americans, to ratify the UN Convention on the Law of Sea
(UNCLOS), the very UN convention that the Australian Government refuses to
acknowledge in its dispute with Timor-Leste. Australia has withdrawn from the
maritime boundary jurisdiction of UNCLOS.
In
1972, when East Timor was still a Portuguese colony, Australia and
Indonesia agreed a boundary dividing the waters separating their
countries. At that time, the continental shelf was generally recognised as the
basis for determining maritime frontiers. As a result, Australia received 85%
and left only 15% to Indonesia. Portugal rejected this arrangement. When
Portugal pulled out in 1975, Indonesia invaded and annexed East Timor. The
Australian ambassador in Jakarta, Richard Woolcott, sent his government a
confidential telegram that has since been made public: "Closing the
present gap in the agreed sea border could be much more readily negotiated with
Indonesia than with Portugal or an independent Portuguese Timor.’ Woolcott
revealed that he had been briefed on Indonesia's secret plans for an invasion.
He cabled Canberra that the government should “assist public understanding in
Australia” to counter “criticism of Indonesia” “
In
1982, the UN Law of the Sea Convention formalised the median line as the basis
for such agreements. Although Indonesia stood to gain in 1989 it signed a
treaty ceding most of the resources in the Timor Gap to Australia in return for
de jure recognition of its sovereignty over East Timor, a recognition that
violated UN resolutions. Portugal took Australia to the International Court of
Justice (ICJ). But Indonesia refused to recognise the ICJ's jurisdiction. In
the absence of one of the parties, the court declared itself incompetent to
rule but warned Australia that the treaty would not be binding on an
independent East Timor.
Under
the treaty of 1989 Australia and Indonesia created a Zone of Cooperation A
(Zoca) in the Timor Gap. If the internationally-accepted median line principle
had been followed, the resulting revenues would have gone entirely to East
Timor. Instead, throughout most of Zoca, the governments shared royalties
equally. Timor's interests were further damaged when the lateral boundaries of
Zoca were drawn so as to exclude the Laminaria-Corallina field to the west and
80% of the Greater Sunrise field to the east.
In
January 2000, a UN legal adviser announced, on the grounds that "we do not
want to retrospectively legitimise, or give any legitimacy to the conclusion of
the treaty, which was done by Indonesia over what is part of the territory of
East Timor. So this is not a case of succession, it is a new legal instrument
that we will create". The terms of the 1989 treaty would be renegotiated
once Timor had achieved independence.
In
March 2002, Australia withdrew from the ICJ's jurisdiction and rejected
arbitration by the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea in Hamburg.
With recourse to the courts ruled out, there remains only the law of the
strongest and where the Australian government was caught bugging the
Timorese cabinet room so it could spy on Timor-Leste’s leaders and officials.
When
East Timor gained independence, a consortium of oil companies led by
ConocoPhilipps demanded a swift agreement on the Bayu-Undan field, which lies
entirely within Zoca, so that they could pursue investments to exploit it.
Australia sought to persuade the Timorese that they would lose everything if
they asked for too much and Australia's foreign minister, Alexander Downer,
remarked ominously that any revision of the share-out of royalties "plays
into the overall size of the Australian aid programme in East Timor".
However, threatened by further action under international the Australian
government conceded 90% of the royalties from Bayu-Undan - 90% of the royalties
from Bayu-Undan came to $100m a year over 20 years, not an insignificant sum.
But this 90% share applies only in the Bayu-Undan field in Zoca, now designated
the Joint Petroleum development area (JPDA). The situation remains unchanged in
the Laminaria/Corallina fields to the west, which Australia exploits
unilaterally at 150,000 barrels per day, and in Greater Sunlight to the east.
These fields would treble East Timor's reserves if the frontiers were redrawn
in accordance with the Timorese claim, which most experts support as legally
correct. Australia continues to contest the claim on the basis of the
continental shelf. Having delayed its response to the Timorese request for border
negotiations until 18 months after independence, the Australian government then
postponed the first meeting until April 2004. When the Timorese demanded
monthly meetings, Australia claimed that lack of time and personnel made a
six-month interval necessary, meanwhile collecting $1m a day from
Laminaria/Corallina.
In
April 2004, Gusmao made an exasperated appeal to public opinion: "If our
larger, more powerful neighbour steals the money we need to repay loans, that
will put us deeper in debt. We will be one more country on the list of
debt-ridden countries all over the world." Australia insisted upon its
generosity in conceding 90% of the royalties from Bayu-Undan and in
giving $170m in aid. Oxfam Australia, however, has calculated that,
during this period, Australia had made more than $1bn from the
Laminaria/Corallina field.
The
Timorese government uses some the money raised from oil and gas revenues to
provide essential services to its young population. Sixty percent of
Timor-Leste’s 1.2 million people are aged under 25 years of age and the country
continues to struggle on key development indicators, including hunger.
According to the UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, malnutrition is a major concern
for Timor-Leste with 44.7 percent of children under five years old underweight.
Sem comentários:
Enviar um comentário