East Timor Moves into the World Court ¹

Christine M. Chinkin ²

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I. Introduction

The events leading to Indonesia's military invasion and subsequent annexation of East Timor, accompanied by repeated allegations of gross violations of human rights,³ are well known. The legality of Indonesia's claim to East Timor as constituting the 27th province of Indonesia has been the subject of much debate.⁴ Sixteen years after the occupation, proceedings were commenced in the International Court of Justice to bring Indonesia's claim and the contrary claim of the people of East Timor to their right to self-determination under judicial scrutiny. However these claims will be raised only in an indirect fashion and neither Indonesia nor East Timor are parties before the Court in the case which is being played out between Portugal and Australia.⁵ This article will discuss the way in which the issue of East Timor has been presented to the Court, and some of the arguments that are likely to be raised in the case.

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1 Note from the Editors:
The European Journal of International Law has decided to occasionally publish articles reviewing the main issues of cases pending before the International Court of Justice. The views expressed in such articles are strictly personal, and do not necessarily reflect those of the editorial board.

2 LLB; LLM; PhD (Sydney); Professor of Law, University of Southampton. This article was first presented as a paper at a conference on the Legal Issues Arising from the East Timor Conflict, sponsored by the Human Rights Centre, University of New South Wales and the International Jurists for East Timor, March 1992. An earlier version appeared as `The Merits of Portugal's Case Against Australia', 15 New South Wales Law Journal (1992) 423.

3 There have been numerous reports by non-governmental organizations such as Amnesty International since 1975 of human rights violations in East Timor. The Dili massacre of 12 November 1991 has focussed international attention on the human rights situation in the Territory; see Keesing's Contemporary Archives, November 1991, 38579-80; Report of the Special Rapporteur on Torture, Peter Kooijmans, E/CN.4/1992/17/Add. 1, 8 January 1992.

4 On the background to the Indonesian invasion of East Timor see C. Budiardjo and L.S. Liong, The War Against East Timor (1984); de Quadros, `Decolonization of Portuguese Territories', in R. Bernhardt (ed.), 10 Encyclopedia of Public International Law (1987) 93. On the legal claims see Elliott, `The East Timor Dispute', 27 ICLQ (1978) 238; Clark, `The "Decolonization" of East Timor and the United Nations Norms on Self-Determination and Aggression', 7 Yale Journal of World Public Order (1982) 2. For a different perspective see A. Alatas, (Minister of Foreign Affairs of Indonesia), East Timor: Debunking the Myths Around a Process of Decolonization, Remarks before the Members of the National Press Club, Washington DC, 20 February 1992.

5 Case Concerning East Timor (Portugal v. Australia) ICJ Reports (1991) 9 (hereafter referred to as the Timor Gap case).

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