Volume 42 | Number 2 Spring 2007
IV. Conclusion
This paper argued that the well-being and ability of children of rape to claim their rights is related to the status of their mothers socially and legally, and this status needs to be addressed in transitional justice debates. Within Timor, there is a definite ambivalence about the idea of these women as contributors to independence during the occupation, and discomfiture regarding their status as so-called “wives” of Indonesian military.
This could be changed by simple policy choices: one discussed above would be to redefine “veteran” status to include victims of rape and sexual slavery and children born as a result. Other solutions might be to convene a special hearing of the Truth Commission (or its successor) or the Parliament to deal with the rights of children born of rape. The Government of East Timor, with international donor funding and encouragement, might also institute a special assistance program for affected families that included a public anti-discrimination campaign. There is a precedent for such a campaign in the domestic violence program run last year. International donors and humanitarian organizations working in East Timor could help to advocate for such an initiative.
The first imperative is to gain qualitative and quantitative data on the situation of these children and their mothers. Such work should endeavour to shifts the approach from a covert welfare to a rights-based framework, and to approach the children as rights-bearers and the subjects of analysis, rather than by-products of a crime or sin.
The position of the women of East Timor is not static and there are some causes for optimism. When Natércia Godinho-Adams addressed the UN Security Council, she pointed out that whilst the Indonesian occupation had been a tragedy for the women of East Timor, the crisis had also created a number of new opportunities for them:
. . . Men’s and women’s roles changed substantially during the years of conflict and social disruption since 1974. A significant number of women assumed active roles in the clandestine liberation front and the armed resistance. They were soldiers, they smuggled medication, food, armament, and information to the resistance movement hiding in the mountains.121
In the absence of the male household head, women assumed the traditionally male role of earning an income sufficient to support a family. East Timorese women do not want to return to the powerless roles they occupied before; instead they want to build a society that will respect their newly acquired post-conflict roles.122
Thus the position of women and, correspondingly, of their children is fluid. While in many ways East Timor remains a patriarchal and traditional society, there are social forces that suggest that women could start to play a greater role in post-conflict reconstruction and governance. The question is whether the society can shed the euphemistic veil that lies over a substantial social and moral issue in East Timor—that of the reintegration and acceptance of women who have suffered rights violations and the right of their children to a future.
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Footnotes
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