Timor-Leste (East Timor): From Genocide to Democracy
A Talk by Janice Maria de Jesus, Pamela Sexton and Curt Gabrielson
Lessons on US foreign policy, international solidarity and impunity
Friday, August 30, 7-9PM at the Resource Center for Nonviolence
20 years ago, on August 30, 1999, despite widespread Indonesian military intimidation
and violence, the East Timorese people declared their sovereignty to the world in a
U.N.-sponsored referendum on independence. The Indonesian military responded by
unleashing a scorched earth campaign which left thousands dead and hundreds of
thousands displaced. Much has happened during the past 20 years, including a national
truth and justice commission report, Chega!, calling for justice for crimes against
humanity committed from 1975 to 1999.
While efforts to end impunity for past crimes have been unsuccessful thus far, there is
still much to celebrate today. Timor-Leste stands as an example of democracy and
tolerance to many of its neighboring nations. Timor-Leste is one of the most oil-
dependent nations in the world, but local organizations are demanding a sustainable,
diversified economic future. Timorese feminist and LGBTQ movements continue to
grow, with support from national leaders, and Timor-Leste leads the world in its
inclusion of permaculture school gardens in the national school curriculum.
About the Speakers
Janicia Maria de Jesus was born in Maliana, Timor-Leste and has studied in the U.S.
for the past four years. She studied architecture at the California College of the Arts,
and is currently studying electronic music production in Pyramind, San Francisco. She
will return to Timor-Leste to help preserve and develop Timorese culture through art,
design, and music, to gain recognition of the Timorese identity around the globe.
Pamela Sexton is a local educator who has worked for 25 years with ETAN, and lived
for 10 years with her family in Timor-Leste. In 1999, Pam was an election observer in
Timor-Leste and U.S. Coordinator for an international solidarity observer project.
Curt Gabrielson ran the Watsonville Environmental Science Workshop and currently
works with the Greenfield Community Science Workshop. He has been a science
educator for more than 20 years, with positions in California public schools, the National
University of East Timor, UNESCO and San Francisco’s Exploratorium Teacher
Institute.
Sponsors:
East Timor and Indonesia Action Network (ETAN) is a U.S.-based grassroots
organization working in solidarity with the peoples of Timor-Leste (East Timor), West
Papua and Indonesia. ETAN provides information about, and ways to help, Timor-Leste,
which was invaded and subjugated by U.S. ally Indonesia in 1975, and which finally
attained independence on May 20, 2002. ETAN educates, organizes and advocates for
justice for historic and ongoing crimes against humanity; for human rights and
democratic development.
The Resource Center for Nonviolence is a peace and justice organization promoting
the practice of nonviolent social change. Our primary mission is to support the growth of
nonviolent activists.
IF is a nonprofit humanitarian, educational and social change organization located in the
Santa Cruz, CA, area. We are a community of friends seeking hopeful alternatives to
the violence, greed and destructiveness of our world.
Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) was founded in
1915 during World War I with Jane Addams as its first president. WILPF works to
achieve through peaceful means world disarmament; full rights for women; racial and
economic justice; an end to all forms of violence; and to establish those political, social,
and psychological conditions which can assure peace, freedom, and justice for all.