The Communists Who Told the World About Suharto’s Crimes
After Indonesian dictator Suharto invaded Timor-Leste in 1975, Australian communists set up an illegal radio station, broadcasting reports from the resistance to the world. Their work exposed atrocities — and Australia’s role in hiding them.
José Ramos-Horta, holding papers, leaves a meeting with Francisco Xavier do Amaral (second from right), then president of East Timor, and other members of FRETILIN in Dili, East Timor, in October 1975. (Ben Tweedie / Corbis via Getty Images)
In September 1974, socialists in Dili founded the Revolutionary Front for the Independence of Timor-Leste, better known as FRETILIN. Against the backdrop of the Cold War, FRETILIN grew from a small group of left-wing intellectuals into East Timor’s main independence party and armed resistance movement.
Remarkably the party survived Portuguese decolonization, a civil war, and a twenty-four-year guerilla struggle against a US-backed Indonesian dictator, General Suharto. In 2001, FRETILIN’s persistence paid off when the party won the first free and fair elections in Timor-Leste.
Crucial to their victory were efforts led by members of the Communist Party of Australia (CPA) to establish and maintain an illegal radio network linking Timor-Leste with the outside world. Known as Radio Maubere, it broadcast from remote areas of Australia’s Northern Territory (NT), a sparsely populated area twice the size of Texas. Between 1975 and 1978, Communists relayed coded messages between FRETILIN fighters, exiled party leaders, and overseas journalists. Their efforts inaugurated the decades-long fight against Indonesian occupation.
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