Conflict, International Intervention and Criminal Tribunals as Transitional Justice Mechanisms: The Legacy of Failed Justice in Timor-Leste

Abstract

The criminal tribunals established separately in East Timor and Jakarta to deal with the atrocities committed in East Timor in 1999 failed as mechanisms of international justice. They did not ensure that the leading political and military perpetrators of the violence were held accountable for their conduct through properly conducted trials, although this would have been an essential ingredient for the restoration of peace and order in post-conflict East Timor. Rather, the resulting culture of impunity that followed the failure of the trials exacerbated deep, underlying social and political tensions in East Timorese society and this contributed to the civil conflict known as the ‘crisis’ that erupted in
2006–07.