East Timor calls on Australia to stop exploiting disputed oil field

[Aidoneus]

East Timor calls on Australia to stop exploiting disputed oil field
By John Roberts
13 February 2004

Long-running disagreements between Australia and East Timor over their maritime border and therefore control of Timor Sea oil and gas erupted again late last year, focusing on revenues from the Laminaria-Corallina fields. East Timor’s Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri and Foreign Minister Jose Ramos Horta both accused Canberra of taking royalties that rightly belonged to Dili.

After talks between the two countries over the border last November, Alkatiri declared that Canberra was violating international law by unilaterally exploiting oil fields in a disputed maritime area. The prime minister claimed that Australia had gained $US1.2 billion in royalties while East Timor had received nothing. He called for a halt in production in the fields until the maritime boundary had been settled and indicated that East Timor may seek repayment of the royalties.

The Laminaria-Corallina oil fields are operated by the Woodside, BHP Billiton and Shell corporations and began production in November 1999. Until recently, Laminaria-Corallina was Australia’s largest oil field. At startup, output averaged 142,500 barrels a day, peaking at up to 180,000 barrels a day, before declining to just 50,000 barrels a day. Logistical support for the operation is based in Darwin in northern Australia.

Laminaria-Corallina was just one of several lucrative oil and gas fields that came under effective Australian control as a result of the Timor Gap Treaty signed with the Suharto dictatorship in Indonesia in 1989. Under the terms of the treaty, Jakarta allocated Canberra much of the seabed wealth in return for formal recognition of Indonesia’s military takeover of East Timor in 1975.

East Timor’s leaders, however, refuse to recognise the 1989 treaty and insist instead that the border should be based on the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). For the tiny, impoverished state, which was granted formal independence in May 2002, oil and gas royalties offer one of the few possible sources of revenue and jobs. Well aware that East Timor desperately requires the income, the Howard government in Canberra has used delaying tactics to bully it into unfavourable agreements.

--snip--

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/feb2004/timo-f13.shtml

[DuctapeFatwa]

1. At least those bad Muslims in Indonesia won't get the oil

Those ungrateful Timorese. They have already forgotten how Australia saved them all and even let them be a country.