A Short History of South-East Asia

by Peter Church

  One favourable development for the country lies in the fact that by the late 1990s the Khmer Rouge ceased to exist as a political or military threat. A succession of military defeats and defections due to a withdrawal of aid from their backers in Thailand and China, and a general decline in the organisation's political relevance in the post–Cold War era, all combined to undermine the Khmer Rouge's influence. Pol Pot died on 15 April 1998, and the movement's last commander at large, Ta Mok, was captured in March 1999. Unrepentant to the end, before his death Pol Pot blamed the Year Zero disaster on disloyal Cambodians and the Vietnamese.

  Many human‐rights observers have been critical of the government's seeming reluctance to prosecute those responsible for the killings committed by the Khmer Rouge. Even though King Sihanouk signed a new law in 2001 setting up a tribunal to try those accused, few former Khmer Rouge officials have been sent to trial. Hun Sen himself has been accused by human‐rights observers and opposition parties of supporting increased repression against protesters, critics, and members of rival political parties, especially in 2003 when he announced the formation of a “Central Bureau for Security” intelligence wing consisting mostly of high‐ranking CPP officials.

  However, in 2013, Parliament passed a bill making it illegal to deny that atrocities were committed by the Khmer Rouge in the 1970s. Also a breakthrough on charges of genocide and crimes committed by the Khmer Rouge was finally made in August 2014 when a UN‐backed court in Cambodia sentenced two senior Khmer Rouge leaders to life in prison for their roles in the terror that swept the country in the 1970s. Nuon Chea, who was the second in command, and the former head of state, Khieu Samphan, were the first top Khmer Rouge figures to be jailed.

  In November 2002, Cambodia hosted the eighth ASEAN Summit and in September 2003 received permission to join the World Trade Organization—the first least‐developed country to be invited to join. In October 2004, King Sihanouk announced he would abdicate, citing ill health. His son, Prince Norodom Sihamoni, a formally trained ballet dancer who did not seek the role, was crowned as king. When King Sihanouk died of a heart attack in October 2012, tens of thousands of people turned up in Phnom Penh for his cremation in February 2013.

  The current government is heavily underwritten by foreign aid donors, especially Japan, the United States, the European Union, and Australia. China has also recently emerged as an important aid donor, lender of “soft” (low‐ or zero‐interest) loans, and foreign investor. As Chinese assistance has tended to be free of the conditions accompanying Western aid (especially regarding progress on human rights and corruption), it has been particularly welcomed by Hun Sen. He described China as Cambodia's “most trustworthy friend” during a visit by Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao in April 2006.

  In a meeting between Hun Sen and Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2014 at the APEC forum, it was reported that China pledged an annual economic development loan of between US$500 and US$700 million starting in 2015. Trade between Cambodia and China had already grown to about US$3.3 billion in 2013. The two countries also agreed to boost their bilateral trade to reach a target of US$5 billion by 2017. Chinese investment in Cambodia rose by 65 percent in 2013 to US$435.82 million compared to $263.59 million in 2012. More importantly, Chinese loans and grants to Cambodia reached US$2.7 billion in 2012, making it one of their largest donors. Cambodia will also gain enormous benefits from new Chinese initiatives such as the Maritime Silk Road and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).

  Dependence on foreign aid (which in the period 2006–2016 was estimated at over US$10 billion) is likely to lessen in the future as donor countries scale back their largesse and Cambodia develops alternative sources of revenue, such as the booming tourist industry. Indeed, the services sector now accounts for nearly half of GDP. Defence spending has also been pared back from 6.4 percent of GDP in the mid‐1990s to approximately 1 percent today, though Cambodia still maintains a large standing army with a top‐heavy command structure. International aid projects and foreign and domestic private enterprise have been encouraged by the “technocrats” who hold the economic portfolios, but face an often‐irresolute government, a still inadequate legal framework, and an unwieldy and often corrupt bureaucracy, customs service, and police force. Law and order has also become a concern, with armed robbery and murder all too common occurrences in a society awash with weapons following decades of civil war.

  The year 2015 marked 30 years with Hun Sen at the helm as prime minister. While he has provided strong leadership and continuity, his autocratic style and the absence of an obvious successor are concerns on the horizon. Hun Sen's political legitimacy remains precarious and performance‐driven but his CPP party is united and organised. The main opposition party, Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP), headed by Sam Rainsy, is growing in popularity as a result of mounting public dissatisfaction with the government's handling of issues such as corruption and nepotism and the CPP's heavy‐handed tactics in putting down dissent. These issues resonate particularly among young voters, who form an increasingly significant portion of the electorate and who have access to social media platforms, which allow them to circumvent state‐controlled traditional media. The increasing importance of social media as a political tool is a phenomenon that is present throughout all the countries of South‐East Asia.

  Over the centuries, Cambodia's fortunes have risen and fallen, depending on the policies of its larger and more powerful neighbours. In this century, it is to be hoped that Cambodians may at long last be in command of their own economic and social development against a backdrop of peace, social cohesion, and political stability—all elements tragically lacking in much of the last one.

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  East Timor

  Little is known about Timor's precolonial history. The opportunities to profit from its abundant sandalwood forests prompted the Portuguese to establish a trading post on the island in 1642, which was around the period the Dutch were consolidating their presence elsewhere across the archipelago and establishing what was to become the Dutch East Indies. Dutch expansion over the subsequent centuries led to a treaty between the two European trading powers, which ceded the eastern half of Timor to Portugal while the Dutch took control of the western half.

  Timor island assumed a strategic importance during World War II and its people endured a brutal wartime occupation in which 10 percent of its population—approximately 50,000 people—are thought to have died. More tragedy was in store for East Timor in the postwar era when the Portuguese—who had resumed control in 1945—abruptly withdrew in 1975 as a result of decolonisation policies being pursued by the newly installed democratic government in Lisbon. Portuguese sovereignty had brought few tangible benefits to the East Timorese people and their sudden departure left East Timor totally unprepared for independence.

  Indonesia's President Suharto became alarmed that a Marxist government seemed likely to take control in the ensuing chaos and, with tacit support from Australia and the United States, the Indonesian armed forces invaded East Timor. In the following year, 1976, Indonesia announced its formal annexation and declared East Timor to be its 27th province, although few countries, or, indeed, the United Nations, ever recognised these claims of sovereignty. The occupation was met by fierce resistance from armed guerillas, the main group of which was called Fretilin. During the period of Indonesian rule, a quarter of the population was estimated to have died from famine and disease.

  The methods by which the occupying forces quelled dissent received huge international exposure during 1991 following what was to become known as the Dili massacre, in which Indonesian soldiers shot dead hundreds of unarmed protesters. Suharto's government was further embarrassed when two of the most internationally prominent anti‐Indonesian figures, exiled Fretilin representative Jose Ramos Horta and Bishop Carlos Belo (spiritual head of East Timor's overwhelmingly Catholic population until his retirement in 2002), were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1996.

  Following Suharto's
resignation in 1998, his successor, BJ Habibie, was keen to end the diplomatic running sore that more than 20 years of failed pacification programmes had come to represent. He announced that a UN‐supervised referendum on greater autonomy would be held on August 30, 1999, and gave assurances that if the East Timorese people rejected it, he would allow East Timor to cut itself loose from Indonesia. When 78 percent of voters rejected Habibie's proposal, the way was clear for full independence.

  In the months following the vote, a wave of violence in which over 2,000 people died was perpetuated by pro‐Jakarta East Timorese militias with the covert backing of the Indonesian military, whose generals had been humiliated by the sudden volte‐face shown by the politicians. During this chaotic period, thousands of refugees fled into West Timor and much of East Timor's infrastructure was razed by rampaging militiamen. When it became clear to Habibie that his army was unwilling to reign in the militias, he reluctantly allowed a UN multinational peacekeeping force to restore order in late 1999 and prepare the territory for full independence, which was formally granted at midnight on May 20, 2002. Former Fretilin commander Xanana Gusmao (who had been captured and imprisoned by the Indonesians in 1992) was sworn in as East Timor's first president after winning 80 percent of the popular vote in presidential elections the preceding month.

  At the time of independence, Gusmao commanded tremendous respect both at home and abroad (and still does), with his stature and integrity earning him frequent comparisons with South Africa's Nelson Mandela. But the problems he and Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri (who headed Fretilin's political wing, which won the biggest block of seats in the Constituent Assembly elections of 2001) faced in leading East Timor into a prosperous future were formidable. Tensions between the two men escalated in March 2006 when one third of the national army (mostly soldiers from the western regions of the country) mutinied amid claims by their commanders that the government had favoured units from the east, which had provided the bulk of anti‐Indonesian rebels during Indonesian rule.

  The mutineers demanded the government resign, and accompanying civil unrest and anarchy resulted in 150,000 people fleeing the capital for refugee camps. An international UN‐sponsored peacekeeping force, led by Australia and including soldiers and police from New Zealand, Malaysia, and Portugal, eventually restored order. On May 30, President Gusmao declared a state of emergency and Prime Minister Alkatiri resigned on June 26 in favour of José Ramos‐Horta. In February 2007, Ramos‐Horta declared his candidacy for forthcoming presidential elections and Gusmao declared his candidacy for prime minister on behalf of a new political party, the Conselho Nacional de Reconstrucão do Timor (CNRT), which was set up to oppose Fretilin's control of parliament. In the 2007 presidential elections, Ramos‐Horta defeated Fretilin's candidate, Francisco Guterres, to become president while legislative elections in the same year resulted in a coalition government (excluding Fretilin, which nonetheless remained the largest single party in parliament) led by the CNRT. Gusmao became prime minister. Fretilin's failure to do as well as expected stemmed from widespread disillusionment at corruption by party functionaries and at the slow pace of reform.

  The country was shocked in early 2008 by coordinated assassination attempts by rebel soldiers on both Gusmao and Ramos‐Horta. On the morning of February 11, Gusmao escaped an attempted ambush while Ramos‐Horta was shot in the chest in a separate attack. He made a remarkable recovery in an Australian hospital and returned triumphant to Dili to resume official duties in April 2008. The rebels' leader, Alfredo Reinado, was killed in the attack on Ramos‐Horta.

  During the 2012 elections, Prime Minister Gusmao's National Congress for Timorese Reconstruction defeated the opposition Fretilin in parliamentary elections, but fell short of a majority. The coalition government continued and, in 2015, Gusmao stepped down as Prime Minister to make way for Fretilin's Rui de Araujo. In an effort to ease political tensions and stabilise the country, de Arajuo formed a coalition government with Gusmao's National Congress.

  With stability reasonably restored, the UN ended its peacekeeping mission in December 2012.

  East Timor is one of the poorest countries in the region with more than 40 percent of its 1.2 million people living below the poverty line. Unemployment in the urban areas remains stubbornly high while the rural sector, which comprises 90 percent of the population, primarily consists of subsistence farmers (though it is hoped coffee may one day constitute a key export market). Illiteracy is estimated at 30 percent and life expectancy is just 64 years.

  In May 2002, Alkatiri set up a petroleum revenue reserve fund based on the Norwegian model in which interest accrued from the fund is used to fund national development. In 2009, Fretilin, then in opposition, bitterly opposed an attempt by Gusmao (as prime minister and leader of the CNRT) to draw on US$240 million of the fund (including its capital base) to generate employment and counter the causes of discontent that rocked the country in 2006. Fretilin accused the government of seeking to operate a slush fund. It is certain that in spite of access to petroleum revenues, the new country will remain heavily dependent for its development on foreign aid and expertise for the foreseeable future.

  In July 2006, East Timor signed the ASEAN Treaty of Amity and Cooperation, the first step toward full membership. In September 2007, Ramos‐Horta announced he had established a task force to prepare for the country's eventual accession to ASEAN, which he predicted would take place in approximately five years. In 2011, East Timor formally applied to join ASEAN and after years of lobbying, it is expected to become the 11th member of ASEAN in 2017. Even though in many ways it has more in common with the constituent members of the Pacific Islands Forum, ASEAN would be a more logical choice given its greater political and economic clout. ASEAN admission would undoubtedly boost its economic outlook and would also provide a further forum for engagement with Indonesia. To this end East Timor's leaders have repeatedly signaled the government's priority is to ensure good relations with Indonesia in order that issues of trade and border demarcation are resolved in a spirit of cooperation.

  The biggest hope for East Timor's economic development stems from its sovereignty over oil and gas reserves in the Timor Sea. In May 2005, Australia and East Timor jointly announced an agreement to carve up multibillion‐dollar offshore oil and gas reserves, following talks which had commenced in 2002 over their disputed maritime boundary. Under the agreement (signed in 2006 and entered into force in 2007), the two countries deferred a decision on a permanent boundary for up to a century. In return, East Timor will derive several billion more dollars from the most profitable Greater Sunrise field than it would have under an interim deal struck in 2002. However, East Timor has never felt the 2006 agreement was fair and feels that Australia had applied undue pressure on East Timor to enter into the agreement at a time when the country was weak and unstable. Not only this, but East Timor also alleges Australia bugged the cabinet office of the East Timor Government to secretly learn of its baseline negotiating position. In April 2016, East Timor took the dispute to the UN's Permanent Court of Arbitration based on its rights under the UN's Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) in an attempt to get Australia to agree to a permanent maritime border, which under previous agreements with Australia it had agreed to defer for 50 years. At the time of publication, no decision has been made but the outcome could be of enormous significance for East Timor if it can move the border to a more favourable position in its sharing of the revenues from oil and gas production.

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  Indonesia

  Indonesia's geography is an integral part of its history. A sprawling archipelago straddling the equator, Indonesia has more than 13,500 islands, ranging from tiny areas that not so long ago were merely atolls to the huge island of Sumatra. In 2015 it had 260 million people, spread very unevenly across these islands. At the one extreme, over 145 million live on densely populated Java; at the other extreme, the large, resource‐rich island of Kalimantan is sparsely populated. Indonesia is a tropical c
ountry with a volcanic spine running through its archipelago. Many volcanoes are still active, every so often wreaking destruction on surrounding peoples and crops. But the volcanic soil and the tropical climate have made most of Indonesia extremely fertile, nowhere more so than the river valleys of Java, where prosperous kingdoms have waxed and waned over more than a thousand years.