East Timor's administrative teething troubles

Additional resentment towards Australia has been fanned more recently, as our diplomatic representatives play "hard ball" over maritime boundaries between Australia and East Timor. The Australian concession of 90 per cent of royalties from the Bayu Undan gas field in the Timor Sea, and 80 per cent from the much larger Sunrise field, may well sound generous until you realise that there is a respectable argument that both fields are entirely inside East Timor's exclusive economic zone under international law of the sea.

No doubt that is why Australia has announced that it will not submit to adjudication of the maritime boundary by the International Court of Justice. Despite this, East Timor’s political leadership seem prepared to take a realpolitik approach, accepting that royalties from the gas fields will be almost the only source of revenue for the next few years. Making concessions to Australia makes pragmatic sense if it avoids holding up development of Timor Sea gas.

For all those reasons, I wasn't really surprised by the recent demonstrations in Dili. But they looked to be fairly good-natured, and that still summarises the general attitude.

Happy just to be alive and free, however poor, and however muddled a government administrative structure they may be blessed with. At least it's their own dysfunctional bureaucracy, and a large step up from being ruled by a corrupt Javanese military empire.