Belu Regency is a

regency A regent (from Latin : ruling, governing) is a person appointed to govern a state '' pro tempore'' (Latin: 'for the time being') because the monarch is a minor, absent, incapacitated or unable to discharge the powers and duties of the monarchy ...

East Nusa Tenggara East Nusa Tenggara ( id, Nusa Tenggara Timur – NTT; pt, Sonda Oriental) is the southernmost province of Indonesia. It comprises the eastern portion of the Lesser Sunda Islands, facing the Indian Ocean in the south and the Flores Sea in the nor ...

province of

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...

. Established on 20 December 1958, Belu Regency has its seat (capital) in the large town of

Atambua Atambua is the regency seat of Belu Regency, East Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia. The town stretches as far as 8.5 km from north to south and 5 km from east to west, and is located in the north of the western half of Timor Island. The town is ...

. In December 2012 a separate Regency - Malaka Regency - was created from the twelve districts that formerly comprised the southern half of Belu Regency. Belu means friend in

Tetum , nativename=Tetun , states= Indonesia East Timor , speakers=, mostly in Indonesia , date=2010–2011 , ref=e18 , speakers2=50,000 L2-speakers in Indonesia and East Timor , familycolor=Austronesian , fam2=Malayo-Polynesian , fam3= Central–East ...

. The residual part of Belu Regency had a population of 188,163 at the 2010 Census, which rose to 206,476 at the 2015 Census and to 217,973 at the 2020 Census. The official estimate as at mid 2021 was 227,397.

Administrative Districts

The Belu Regency was until 2013 divided into twenty-four districts (''kecamatan''), but in December 2012, the twelve southern ''kecamatan'' were removed to form the new Malaka Regency, leaving the twelve northern ''kecamatan'' in Belu Regency. The residual Belu Regency is thus composed of twelve districts (''kecamatan''), tabulated below with their areas (in km²) and their populations at the 2010 Census and 2020 Census, together with the official estimates as at mid 2021.Badan Pusat Statistik, Jakarta, 2022. The table also includes the location of the district headquarters, the number of administrative villages (rural ''desa'' and urban ''kelurahan'') in each district, and its postal code. Note: (a) the five westerly rural ''kecamatan'', mainly surrounding or south of Atambua. (b) the area projecting into

East Timor East Timor (), also known as Timor-Leste (), officially the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste, is an island country in Southeast Asia. It comprises the eastern half of the island of Timor, the exclave of Oecusse on the island's north-west ...

Media

Belu Regency is served with four radio stations that cover the wider area around this regency (including Malaka Regency,

Alor Regency Alor Regency ( id, Kabupaten Alor) is a regency (''kabupaten'') in East Nusa Tenggara (NTT) province of Indonesia. Established in 1958, Alor Regency administers the Alor Archipelago with its seat (capital) in Kalabahi on Alor Island. Alor Regency ...

, and Timor Tengah Utara Regency), which are RRI Pro1 Atambua (FM 91.5 MHz) RRI Pro2 Atambua (FM 99.8 MHz) RRI Pro3 (FM 99.0 MHz), and Saluran Citra Budaya Timor (alias Pro4) (FM 93.1 MHz). There's still a lot of radio that can be found in the

town A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in different parts of the world. Origin and use The word "town" shares an ori ...

. The regency is only served with two television stations (

TVRI TVRI (, Television of the Republic of Indonesia), legally ( Public Broadcasting Institution Television of the Republic of Indonesia) is a public television network and the oldest television network in Indonesia. Its national headquarters is i ...

- including TVRI East Nusa Tenggara, Belu TV) and a few other East Timor stations that reach the border pass.

References

Regencies of East Nusa Tenggara {{ENusaTenggara-geo-stub