Balibo is a town in East Timor situated approximately from the Indonesian border. It is located in the

subdistrict A subdistrict or sub-district is an administrative division that is generally smaller than a district. Equivalents * Administrative posts of East Timor, formerly Portuguese-language * Kelurahan, in Indonesia * Mukim, a township in Brunei, In ...

of Balibo, Bobonaro District. It was estimated by Human Rights Watch that 70 per cent of the town was destroyed during the militia violence that preceded the vote on East Timorese independence. Balibo achieved notoriety as the site of the killing of five

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

n-based

journalists A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalism ...

now known as the Balibo Five, by Indonesian forces in the 1970s. Australian reporters from Channels 7, 9 and the ABC were covering an incursion by Indonesia into what was then Portuguese Timor. The reporters from Channels 7 and 9 were killed on October 16th, 1975 by Indonesian Special Forces, to prevent information about the invasion from being released. In December 1975, another Australian reporter, Roger East, who was investigating the deaths of the other five, was reportedly seized by Indonesian soldiers, and then shot by a firing squad. The town is home to a 400-year-old fort, which was the scene of several battles during the Indonesian invasion in 1975. The Balibo Five were also filming from the fort when Indonesian forces landed in Balibo on the day they died. The fort has been converted into a hotel as of 2016 by the Balibo House Trust, with support from the Rotary Club of Port Melbourne. The Balibo Declaration, which criticised the declaration of independence and was later used by the Indonesian government as partial justification for its invasion, was said to have been signed here but was actually drafted by Indonesian intelligence and signed in

Bali Bali () is a province of Indonesia and the westernmost of the Lesser Sunda Islands. East of Java and west of Lombok, the province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nu ...

, Indonesia. During the INTERFET mission after the Indonesian withdrawal, the fort was used as a base for approximately one thousand United Nations troops, as part of

Operation Lavarack Operation or Operations may refer to: Arts, entertainment and media * ''Operation'' (game), a battery-operated board game that challenges dexterity * Operation (music), a term used in musical set theory * ''Operations'' (magazine), Multi-Man ...

Kylie Minogue Kylie Ann Minogue (; born 28 May 1968) is an Australian singer, songwriter and actress. She is the highest-selling female Australian artist of all time, having sold over 80 million records worldwide. She has been recognised for reinve ...

performed an unplugged concert in Balibo to entertain United Nations troops in 1999, as part of the Tour of Duty series of concerts. In 2003, the government of Victoria,

purchased the house where the five journalists had stayed, as it had fallen into disrepair, and renovated it to serve as a creche, library and vocational training centre. International aid organizations have also been involved in other reconstruction work in the town, such as the rebuilding of a dormitory for schoolchildren from remote communities that had been razed during the militia attacks.

References

{{Authority control Populated places in East Timor Bobonaro Municipality

See also

References