Word: timorous
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...Australia and East Timor were at war over territory, the conflict would be called asymmetric. East Timor (pop. 800,000) is one of the world's poorest countries; its neighbor Australia (pop. 20 million) is among the richest. In their efforts to negotiate a permanent legal fence in the Timor Sea, the difference in firepower and tactics could hardly be greater. It is as if a small guerrilla force was facing an opponent that could call in air strikes at any moment. So far, the engagement has produced only bad blood and rancor...
...East Timor is pressing for a maritime boundary equidistant between the countries. Current arrangements for sharing a sea zone known as the Joint Petroleum Development Area-which give 90% of taxes and royalties to East Timor-bring it about $4 billion. Over the coming decades, an extra $8 billion could go to Dili if it can capture the oil and gas fields to the east and west of the JPDA. But first it must persuade Australia, and then the Indonesians (who occupied the territory between 1975-99), with whom sea-boundary talks are imminent. "The petroleum resources are utterly essential...
...Countries are entitled to claim an exclusive zone extending 200 nautical mi. (370 km) from their coast. "When countries have overlapping claims," says Nuno Antunes, East Timor's legal adviser, "the best settlement is to be found in international law." Citing 75 precedents, he says equidistance is the key principle. But a median line would put all the petroleum reserves on Timor's side. Australia argues that the contours of the seabed are unique. "We have successfully established that the natural promulgation of the continent extends to the Timor Trough," says an Australian official involved in the talks last month...
...Foreign Minister Alexander Downer says Australia has been extremely generous. "We agreed to give East Timor 90% [of the JPDA] ? and now we are told that we are thieves and cheats," he says. "They obviously don't regard the relationship with Australia as highly as I thought." In the past four years, the country has spent $170 million on aid and development; Canberra sent 5,700 troops and led the U.N.'s INTERFET force in 1999 after East Timor's vote for nationhood triggered a killing spree by pro-Indonesian militias...
...week. Presidential candidate Wiranto, the former military chief of former strongman Suharto, announced that his running mate in July's election would be Solahuddin Wahid, deputy chairman of the country's Commission on Human Rights. Wiranto was in charge of the army in 1999 when hundreds died in East Timor at the hands of anti-independence militias allegedly funded and armed by the military. Wiranto continues to be dogged by these accusations: last week he was ordered arrested by a U.N.-backed court in East Timor for alleged war crimes, which he vehemently denies. But Solahuddin now insists that...