James Dunn – CV (credit Dr. Clinton Fernandes)

Born 1928 in Bundaberg, Queensland. Graduated from the University of Melbourne (Hons. Political Science) and Russian: and the ANU – (Asian studies with a special focus on Indonesian language, politics and history). Earlier he served in the Army at the end of World War II, spending two years in the occupation of Japan, for the first six months in a unit on the outskirts of the then devastated city of Hiroshima.

For more than 30 years he was a government official specialising in the field of international relations: first as a defence analyst, specializing on Indonesia, then a diplomat, serving first in Portuguese Timor as consul, then as West European desk officer, followed by postings to Paris and Moscow. During this time he spent periods in other Eastern European countries, including in Yugoslavia, Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Poland. In 1969 he served as Conference Secretary for the Five Power Meeting on Defence in Canberra.

From 1970 to 1986 he was Director of the Foreign Affairs Group of the Parliament’s Legislative Research Service, in effect the senior foreign affairs adviser to the Australian federal parliament. In 1974 he was sent on a fact-finding mission to East Timor, after which he wrote a report on the situation in the colony and its future options (recommending support for self-determination). In 1975 he was appointed leader of a mission sent to Timor by the Australian Council for Overseas Aid with the aim, among others, of negotiating the return of the Portuguese provincial government in order to head off the Indonesian invasion. In 1999 he was a UN observer at the plebiscite, remaining in Dili during the militia violence, until evacuation in September. He returned to Timor shortly after the Interfet intervention and acted as an adviser to the newly established UNTAET mssion leaders.

After resigning from the Parliament in 1986 he worked on international human rights, in particular on a series of human rights congresses, and on international missions in West Africa and Latin America. In 1986 he was co-president of the Second World Congress on Human Rights at Dakar, Senegal. He became a member of the Federation des Droits de l’Homme, and, along with the late Sir Mark Oliphant, was a founder of the Human Rights Council of Australia, and was its first president.

The growing importance of international human rights and concern at the question of East Timor led him to address officials and committees in Portugal, at the EC, the European Parliament, the UK Parliament and governments in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands and Japan. He testified in favour of East Timor’s self determination before a committee of the US Congress in 1977 and, in the same year, before the Fourth Committee of the UN General Assembly. He subsequently made regular visits to the UNGA to discuss the Timor problem. He has also addressed seminars at Yale, Oxford, and MacGill University (Montreal) and in 1995 was Coventry Peace Lecturer, and a key-note speaker at a conference on Timor in Dublin. In October 2001 he was commissioned by the United Nations as an expert on Crimes Against Humanity in East Timor, and, with a retired New Zealand Ambassador, was also appointed to conduct a diplomacy course in Dili, for Timorese who were to become members of the new nation’s diplomatic service.

For some years he has also been writing on general international relations as a foreign affairs columnist – first for a year with the Bulletin, occasionally for the Sydney Morning Herald and the Melbourne Age, and for 13 years has been a weekly foreign affairs columnist for the Illawarra Mercury.

He has also been a member of a genocide project at Yale University, and is a co-author of Genocide in the Twentieth Century (Garland Press, NY).

James Dunn is author of the following works:

Timor: A People Betrayed (first published in 1983, revised and updated in 1996).

The Balibo Incident in Perspective (Paper published by the British Parliament’s Human Rights Group, London, 1995).

East Timor: A Rough Passage to Independence (Longville Press, Sydney, 2003)

And contributing author in the following.

East Timor at the Crossroads (Cassels, London, 1995)
Genocide in the Twentieth Century (Garland Press, New York, 1995)
The Widening Circle of Genocide (Transaction Press, New
Brunswick, USA, 1994)
Genocide: Conceptual and Historical Dimensions (Uni of Penn.
Press Philadelphia, 1993).
He has also written studies of conflicts in the Falklands, in former Yugoslavia, and of the position of the Armenian and the Kurdish peoples.

In 1999 he was awarded the ACFOA human rights award, and in 2001 was invested as a member of the Order of Australia (AM). In May 2002 President Sampaio of Portugal conferred on him the honour – Grande Official of the Order of Prince Henry. In 2009 he was decorated with East Timor’s Medallion of Honour by President Horta.

East Timor:

After serving as Australia’s consul to Portuguese Timor in the 1960s, he went back in 1974 on a fact-finding mission. His influential report on the situation in the colony and its future options recommended support for self-determination. In 1975 he was appointed leader of a mission sent to Timor by the Australian Council for Overseas Aid with the aim, among others, of negotiating the return of the Portuguese provincial government in order to head off the Indonesian invasion.

He campaigned and lobbied throughout the 24-year occupation of East Timor, testifying before the US Congress and building critical support from Senators there and elsewhere. He lobbied officials and committees in Portugal, at the EC, the European Parliament, the UK Parliament and governments in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands and Japan. He testified in favour of East Timor’s self determination before a committee of the US Congress in 1977 and, in the same year, before the Fourth Committee of the UN General Assembly. He subsequently made regular visits to the UNGA to discuss the Timor problem. He addressed seminars at Yale, Oxford, and McGill University (Canada). In 1995 he was Coventry Peace Lecturer, and a key-note speaker at a conference on East Timor in Dublin.

In 1999 he was a UN observer at the 30 August Ballot on Independence, remaining in Dili during the violence, until evacuation in September. He returned to Timor shortly after the Interfet intervention and acted as an adviser to the newly established UNTAET mission leaders. In October 2001 he was commissioned by the United Nations as an expert on Crimes Against Humanity in East Timor, and was also appointed to conduct a diplomacy course in Dili, for Timorese who were to become members of the new nation’s diplomatic service.