Cover of Death in Balibo, lies in Canberra
Read Time: ~3.3 hr

Death in Balibo, lies in Canberra

by Desmond Ball & Hamish McDonald (2000)

About this book

For over two decades the deaths of five newsmen in Balibo, East Timor has nagged at consciences in Australia, Britain and New Zealand. This is a story of lies that reveal the workings of a clandestine system of deceit and names those involved in a 24-year trail of cover-ups and denials.BLOOD ON WHOSE HANDS?Australian diplomats in Jakarta and Canberra or Australian defence intelligence operatives? Senior ministers in the Whitlam government or senior public servants?At first light on 16 October 1975, Indonesian special forces stormed the East Timor village of Balibo, killing five newsmen. A quarter of a century later, the fate of these unarmed civilians continues to nag at consciences in Britain, New Zealand and Australia.Did highly-placed Australians secretly 'sign off' on Indonesia's plan to invade its neighbour? Did they know that the newsmen were targets? Did they choose to leave these young men to the mercy of the Indonesian Army?In this book, a long-term analyst of Indonesian defence and foreign policy and a world-renowned expert on military intelligence uncover what Canberra has been hiding.Here is a story that follows a trail of cover-ups and denials which reaches from Australia's capital to Jakarta... to five corpses in a small village in East Timor.'A thoroughly researched indictment against successive Australian governments and the senior bureaucrats and intelligence elite of Australia, for connivance in the Indonesian invasion of East Timor and for a quarter century of cover up.'-The Hon. Justice John Dowd AO, President, Australian Section, International Commission of Jurists'This is an account of how the Australian secret intelligence community and pliant politicians conspired to suppress the truth about the murder of five TV journalists in Timor on 1975. Long overdue, convincing, restrained and truly shocking, it is a 'must read' for anyone concerned about the future of open government.'- Phillip Knightley, author of The First Casualty, a history of war correspondents.

Setting / LocationLondon & UK
Story EraContemporary / Future
Protagonist / CoreDeath in Balibo, lies in Canberra Lead Character

Readers who enjoyed this also loved

Cover of New Labour and the European Union

New Labour and the European Union

Oliver Daddow

Explores attempts by Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, and the new Labour party to sell the European ideal to the British people.

Cover of The politics of chaos in the Middle East

The politics of chaos in the Middle East

Olivier Roy

In this book, Olivier Roy, Europe's leading scholar of political Islam, argues that the consequences of the "war on terror" have artificially conflated conflicts in the Middle East in such a way that they appear to be the expression of a widespread "Muslim anger" against the West. But in reality, there are no us and them. Instead, the West faces an array of "reverse alliances" that operate according to their own logic and dynamics. The West supports General Musharraf in Pakistan, yet his military intelligence services are in league with the Taliban; in Iraq, the United States shores up a government that is closely linked to its archenemy, Iran; Iraqi Kurds, allies of the Americans, give sanctuary to the PKK, an adversary of a fellow NATO member, Turkey; while the Saudis support the Iraqi Sunnis who are, in turn, fighting Coalition forces. As if these issues were not complicated enough, the ever-worsening Shia-Sunni divide now threatens to disrupt any future strategic planning the West might attempt in the Middle East. Roy unravels the complexity of these conflicts in order to better understand the political discontent that sustains them. He also emphasizes that the war on terror should not be regarded merely as a geopolitical blunder committed by a fringe group of neoconservatives. It is instead a problematic outgrowth of our deeply rooted Western perceptions of the Middle East, including the belief that Islam, rather than politics, is the overarching factor in these conflicts, thus explaining the West's support for either would-be secular democrats or (more or less) benign dictators. Roy's conclusion argues that the West has no alternative but to engage in a dialogue with the political forces that truly matter—namely the Islamo-nationalists of Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood.

Cover of American ally

American ally

Con Coughlin

Using his intelligence sources and unique access to top aides in both the Bush and Blair camps, journalist and best-selling author Con Coughlin has written the definitive book on this crucial relationship between Britain and the US and the personalities involved.

Cover of Germany and the future of European security

Germany and the future of European security

Christoph Bluth

"A major theme of the book is Germany's promotion of both the deepening and widening of the European Union; using the example of EMU, the book reaches conclusions that contradict many of the views expressed in the general political debate in Britain and elsewhere and thereby makes its own original and perhaps controversial contribution. Finally the book examines how Germany has fared in developing its position as a 'civilian power' in the context of the future prospects for European security. The author concludes that Germany has a central role to play in the future of the European system of states, but that it is neither to be feared nor that its power should be exaggerated."--BOOK JACKET.

Death in Balibo, lies in Canberra by Desmond Ball & Hamish McDonald | Literally Just Books