Timor-Leste (East Timor): ASEAN’s newest member looks forward from a painful past

Join the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand for a special event reflecting on Timor-Leste's remarkable journey. The nation recently became ASEAN's newest member, 26 years after a brutal occupation by Indonesia that claimed many lives and destroyed infrastructure. This event honors the journalists who documented the conflict and looks forward to Timor-Leste's future ties with ASEAN partners and Australia.

The evening will feature a rare screening of Carmela Baranowska’s powerful documentary, 'Scenes from an Occupation: East Timor 1999'. This film, winner of the 2000 Rory Peck Award, is the only one to document the final six months of Indonesia’s occupation. It also pays tribute to the late John Martinkus, a journalist who bravely alerted the world to the emerging threats in the region.

Before the film, Francisco Tilman Cepeda, Ambassador of Timor-Leste to Thailand, will deliver opening remarks. Following the screening, a panel discussion will take place with Dr. Carmela Baranowska, director of the film, and Ian Timberlake, an AFP correspondent who was in East Timor in 1999. Jonathan Head, an FCCT board member, will moderate the discussion. An exhibition of Ian Timberlake's photos from the period will also be on display.