„Sie haben uns einzeln vergewaltigt“: Osttimors vergessene Kriegsfrauen des Krieges

***The Telegraph reports:***

Isa was 14-years-old the first time she was raped.

It was March 1976. A few months earlier, Indonesia had invaded the small island nation of East Timor, sending thousands of soldiers into the country in what would become a decades-long massacre.

Isa had watched as uniformed men rolled tanks down the streets of the capital Dili, until one day they stopped in front of her house.

“I was taking a nap when I saw the soldier come and stand by my bedroom. I was terrified because he had a gun,” she told The Telegraph.

The soldier attacked her while her family sat in the next room, unable to stop him or they would be killed.

“He took off my underwear and raped me on my bed. He didn’t even bother to take off my dress,” she said, speaking to The Telegraph at the offices of the Pirilampu ‘Firefly’ Centre, a foundation that she now runs to help support victims of sexual violence.

From late 1975 until 1999, Indonesian soldiers swept through East Timor, ravaging towns, forcibly starving communities and raping women like Isa.

East Timor is located around 430 miles north-west of Australia and makes up the eastern half of the island of Timor, which it shares with Indonesia.

Over the course of its 24-year occupation Indonesian troops killed an estimated 200,000 people out of a population of only around 600,000, in what many scholars have since labelled as genocide.

Indonesian forces finally withdrew in 1999 and East Timor officially became independent in 2002 following three years under a transitional authority run by the United Nations.

Today, 50 years on from the invasion, survivors like Isa have managed to rebuild their lives, but most of those responsible for the violence have never been brought to justice – and as years go by, there’s a chance that many never will.

**Read more:** [**https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/women-and-girls/east-timors-forgotten-women-of-war-sexual-violence/**](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/women-and-girls/east-timors-forgotten-women-of-war-sexual-violence/)

I could have gone to Bali a couple years ago, but I didn’t because I don’t approve of Indonesia’s past and present policies. West Papua still struggles for independence to this day.