East Timor

East Timor, officially the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste, occupies the eastern half of the island of Timor along with the coastal exclave of Oecusse on the island's northwest and the islands of Atauro and Jaco, covering a total area of 15,007 square kilometers, with a land border to Indonesia in the west and Australia as its southern maritime neighbor across the Timor Sea. Dili, on Timor's north coast, is the capital and largest city of a country whose 2022 census recorded 1,341,737 inhabitants, a population skewed heavily toward youth, predominantly Roman Catholic, and linguistically diverse with 30 indigenous languages alongside official Portuguese and Tetum. Indonesia occupied the territory from 1975 to 1999 in a period marked by severe human rights abuses; a United Nations-sponsored referendum in 1999 led to independence on 20 May 2002, making East Timor the first new sovereign state of the twenty-first century. East Timor is a unitary semi-presidential republic, led by President Jose Ramos-Horta and Prime Minister Xanana Gusmao under a unicameral National Parliament; the country remains relatively poor, its economy dependent heavily on oil and other natural resources along with foreign aid.