An assessment of the needs of families of the missing in Timor-Leste

Families of the Missing in Timor have a broad range of needs, driven by their experience of conflict, widespread poverty in the country and the importance to all Timorese of spiritual issues deriving from the animist culture that coexists with a deep commitment to Catholicism. Needs of families cannot be uniquely described; they vary as a function of wealth, education, whether a family is urban or rural, and the time and circumstance of disappearance. This report, and the ethnographic methodology that underlies the research, aims to describe the range of needs families articulated, permitting the words of victims themselves to outline needs on the terms of the families themselves. Since the end of the conflict a range of experts, local and foreign, as well as the nation‘s leaders have spoken on behalf of victims of the conflict, commenting on the need of victims for prosecutorial justice, or conversely their prioritising of reconciliation with Indonesia. These statements have not been based on any rigorous empirical work with victims of the conflict and it is hoped that this study can permit victims ‘priorities to finally emerge, untarnished by the agendas of others.