On 12 November 1991, Indonesian troops opened fire on independence activists in East Timor's capital, Dili.
During a protest march to the Santa Cruz cemetery after a memorial service for an independence supporter, Indonesian troops opened fire, killing 271 people.
In 2015, Marco Silva spoke to British cameraman Max Stahl who filmed the attack on unarmed demonstrators.
Eye-witness accounts brought to life by archive. Witness History is for those fascinated by the past. We take you to the events that have shaped our world through the eyes of the people who were there.
For nine minutes every day, we take you back in time and all over the world, to examine wars, coups, scientific discoveries, cultural moments and much more.
Recent episodes explore everything from the death of Adolf Hitler, the first spacewalk and the making of the movie Jaws, to celebrity tortoise Lonesome George, the Kobe earthquake and the invention of superglue.
We look at the lives of some of the most famous leaders, artists, scientists and personalities in history, including: Eva Peron – Argentina’s Evita; President Ronald Reagan and his famous ‘tear down this wall’ speech; Thomas Keneally on why he wrote Schindler’s List; and Jacques Derrida, France’s ‘rock star’ philosopher.
You can learn all about fascinating and surprising stories, such as the civil rights swimming protest; the disastrous D-Day rehearsal; and the death of one of the world’s oldest languages.
(Photo: The Santa Cruz cemetery. Credit: Giulio Paletta/UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)
