East Timor (Timor-Leste) | Facts
and History Guide
Capital:
Dili, population about 150,000.
Government:
East Timor is a parliamentary democracy, in
which the President is Head of State and
the Prime Minister is Head of Government.
The President is directly elected to this
largely ceremonial post; he or she appoints
the leader of the majority party in
parliament as Prime Minister. The President
serves for five years.
The Prime Minister is head of the Cabinet,
or Council of State. He also leads the single-
house National Parliament.
The highest court is called the Supreme
Court of Justice.
Jose Ramos-Horta is the current President
of East Timor. The Prime Minister is Xanana
Gusmao.
Population:
East Timor's population is around 1.2
million, although no recent census data
exist. The country is growing quickly, due
both to returning refugees and to a high
birth rate.
The people of East Timor belong to dozens
of ethnic groups, and intermarriage is
common. Some of the largest are the
Tetum, around 100,000 strong; the
Mambae, at 80,000; the Tukudede, at
63,000; and the Galoli, Kemak, and Bunak,
all with about 50,000 people.
There are also small populations of people
with mixed Timorese and Portuguese
ancestry, called mesticos, as well as ethnic
Hakka Chinese (around 2,400 people).
Official Languages:
The official languages of East Timor are
Tetum and Portuguese. English and
Indonesian are "working languages."
Tetum is an Austronesian language in the
Malayo-Polynesian family, related to
Malagasy, Tagalog, and Hawaiian. It is
spoken by about 800,000 people world-
wide.
Colonists brought Portuguese to East Timor
in the sixteenth century, and the Romance
language has influenced Tetum to a large
degree.
Other commonly-spoken languages include
Fataluku, Malalero, Bunak, and Galoli.
Religion:
An estimated 98 per cent of East Timorese
are Roman Catholic , another legacy of
Portuguese colonization. The remaining two
per cent are divided almost evenly between
Protestants and Moslems.
A significant proportion of Timorese also
retain some traditional animist beliefs and
customs from pre-colonial times.
Geography:
East Timor covers the eastern half of Timor,
the largest of the Lesser Sunda Islands in
the Malay Archipelago. It covers an area of
about 14,600 square kilometers, including
one non-contiguous piece called the Ocussi-
Ambeno region, in the northwest of the
island.
The Indonesian province of East Nusa
Tenggara lies to the west of East Timor.
East Timor is a mountainous country; the
highest point is Mount Ramelau at 2,963
meters (9,721 feet). The lowest point is sea
level.
Climate:
East Timor has a tropical monsoon climate,
with a wet season from December to April,
and a dry season from May through
November. During the wet season, average
temperatures range between 29 and 35
degrees Celsius (84 to 95 degrees
Fahrenheit). In the dry season,
temperatures average 20 to 33 degrees
Celsius (68 to 91 Fahrenheit).
The island is susceptible to cyclones. It also
experiences seismic events such as
earthquakes and tsunamis, as it lies on the
faultlines of the Pacific Ring of Fire .
Economy:
The economy of East Timor is in shambles,
neglected under Portuguese rule, and
deliberately sabotaged by occupation
troops during the war for independence
from Indonesia. As a result, the country is
among the poorest in the world.
Close to half of the population lives in
poverty, and as many as 70 per cent face
chronic food insecurity. Unemployment
hovers around the 50 per cent mark, as
well. The per capita GDP was only about
$750 U.S. in 2006.
East Timor's economy should improve in
coming years. Plans are underway to
develop off-shore oil reserves, and the
price of cash crops like coffee is rising.
Prehistoric Timor:
The inhabitants of Timor are descended
from three waves of migrants. The first to
settle the island, Vedo-Australoid people
related to Sri Lankans, arrived between
40,000 and 20,000 B.C. A second wave of
Melanesian people around 3,000 B.C. drove
the original inhabitants, called Atoni, up
into the interior of Timor. The Melanesians
were followed by Malay and Hakka people
from southern China .
Most of the Timorese practiced subsistence
agriculture. Frequent visits from sea-going
Arab, Chinese, and Gujerati traders brought
in metal goods, silks, and rice; the Timorese
exported beeswax, spices, and fragrant
sandalwood.
History of Timor, 1515-present:
By the time the Portuguese made contact
with Timor in the early sixteenth century, it
was divided into a number of small
fiefdoms. The largest was the kingdom of
Wehale, composed of a mixture of Tetum,
Kemak, and Bunak peoples.
Portuguese explorers claimed Timor for
their king in 1515, lured by the promise of
spices. For the next 460 years, the
Portuguese controlled the eastern half of
the island, while the Dutch East India
Company took the western half as part of
its Indonesian holdings. The Portuguese
ruled coastal regions in cooperation with
local leaders, but had very little influence in
the mountainous interior.
Although their hold on East Timor was
tenuous, in 1702 the Portuguese officially
added the region to their empire, renaming
it "Portuguese Timor." Portugal used East
Timor mainly as a dumping ground for
exiled convicts.
The formal boundary between the Dutch
and Portuguese sides of Timor was not
drawn until 1916, when the modern-day
border was fixed by the Hague.
In 1941, Australian and Dutch soldiers
occupied Timor, hoping to fend off an
anticipated invasion by the Imperial
Japanese Army. Japan seized the island in
February of 1942; the surviving Allied
soldiers then joined with local people in
guerilla war against the Japanese. Japanese
reprisals against the Timorese left about
one in ten of the island's population dead,
a total of more than 50,000 people.
After the Japanese surrender in 1945,
control of East Timor was returned to
Portugal. Indonesia declared its
independence from the Dutch, but made no
mention of annexing East Timor.
In 1974, a coup in Portugal moved the
country from a rightist dictatorship to a
democracy. The new regime sought to
disentangle Portugal from its overseas
colonies, a move that the other European
colonial powers had made some 20 years
earlier. East Timor declared its
independence in 1975.
In December of that year, Indonesia
invaded East Timor, capturing Dili after just
six hours of fighting. Jakarta declaring the
region the 27th Indonesian province. This
annexation, however, was not recognized
by the UN.
Over the next year, between 60,000 and
100,000 Timorese were massacred by
Indonesian troops, along with five foreign
journalists.
Timorese guerillas kept fighting, but
Indonesia did not withdraw until after the
fall of Suharto in 1998. When the Timorese
voted for independence in an August, 1999
referendum, Indonesian troops destroyed
the country's infrastructure.
East Timor joined the UN on September 27,
