East Timor, under the wing of Indonesia, was always a troubled and war ravaged province. In 1975 when Indonesia "annexed" Timor many conflicts begun. More than 200,000 people have died since then. In 1999 Portugal and Indonesia were meeting to discuss autonomy for East Timor, meaning they would be a self-governed country. The Indonesian soldiers would be removed and they would be able to make their own decisions on "peacekeeping". After many talks between Indonesian and Australian ambassadors and the United Nations, they decided to have a U.N. controlled ballot, where the East Timorese people would vote for or against autonomy. An agreement was signed on the 5th May 1999 to allow the U.N. to enter East Timor and control the ballot. Indonesia's military force would still overlook the security while the ballot was on, as the idea of a U.N. peacekeeping force was rejected by Indonesia. The referendum, which took place in August, would then show that most (98.6% population present, 80% voted for independence) of the Timorese people supported independence. After the matter was voted on there was al very large outbreak of violence. This was mainly between independence supporters and the Militia. Many independence-supporting fighters believed that the Militia was backed by the Indonesian military, which did not want to lose their "province". Immediately Australia took action. They mobilised an international peacekeeping force to stop the ongoing outbreak of crowd violence coming from the supporters of the Militia. The U.N. sent in a peace organisation called INTERFET (International Force for East Timor). There had been 22 nations that contributed to INTERFET. These include: Philippines, Singapore Thailand, New Zealand, Britain, United States of America, Brazil, Portugal, Sweden, Italy, Norway, Pakistan and Australia. The U.N. had also started a transitional administration in East Timor to watch in on the countries move to freedom and independence.
