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Vendors at the Taibesi market in Dili, East Timor, in September. The country’s economy remains heavily reliant on oil and gas. The Growing Pains of Asia’s Newest Country
East Timor has become a stable democracy after securing independence in 2002. But its finances are precarious, and nearly half of its people live in poverty.
Vendors at the Taibesi market in Dili, East Timor, in September. The country’s economy remains heavily reliant on oil and gas. Credit…
By Sui-Lee Wee
Photographs by Ulet Ifansasti
Sui-Lee Wee reported from Dili, the capital of East Timor, and the municipalities of Liquiçá and Ermera in the northwestern part of the country.
Feb. 16, 2025 Updated 10:34 a.m. ET Three decades ago, he was a scrappy campaigner roaming the world’s corridors of power with a dream to win independence for his tiny homeland. Today, at 75, José Ramos-Horta is both the president and a relentless salesman for East Timor.
He asked China’s president, Xi Jinping, to “help us resolve the problem of agriculture, food security and poverty.” He pleaded with Vietnam’s leaders to do the same. He pitched Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed, the ruler of the United Arab Emirates, his dream of building student dormitories.
Mr. Ramos-Horta is under mounting pressure to sustain his nation, Asia’s youngest and one of its poorest. Home to about 1.4 million people, East Timor is one half of an island that lies near the northern tip of Australia; the other half is part of Indonesia. A Portuguese colony for centuries, it emerged as an independent state in 2002 after a brutal occupation by Indonesia. Its roughly $2 billion economy remains heavily reliant on oil and gas revenue, which is evaporating quickly, and more than 40 percent of its people are estimated to live in poverty.
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East Timor was briefly in the global spotlight last year when Pope Francis visited the country. A big cleanup effort preceded his arrival. Image
People looking through secondhand clothes at a market in Ermera in September. “No country in Southeast Asia or in Africa began as we did, from ashes, from total destruction,” Mr. Ramos-Horta said. But, he added: “In 22 years, we should have resolved child poverty, child malnutrition, mother malnutrition and extreme poverty. So that has been a failure.”
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