Do write your side of the story as well. As a SE Asian, the history is fascinating to me, and we all know how a lot of it has been buried and misinterpreted.

My wife's grandma used to tell stories about Japanese wartime. Things like babies being thrown and 'caught' with a blade, about how a rebellious relative was tortured with a firehose but miraculously survived. How the Chinese ethnics would pretend to be Malay for fear of torture.

But she couldn't blog, so these stories all disappeared. Nobody was around to record or verify them either. She could be lying or it could be false memories for all we know. But we need the pieces to connect them and see which make sense or not.

The atrocities carried by Indonesians to Indonesians slip through your comments. The religious persecution of non-muslims in Papua and Bali, and the literal genocide in East Timour.

Reminder that the "pacification campaigns" genocide carried out by Indonesian military on East Timour _civilians_ only seized in 1999 (25 years ago) after UN peace forces intervention.

In 1991, Indonesian soldiers opened fire on a peaceful crowd of 2500 people gathering at a memorial mass Santa Cruz Cemitery. It is documented that at least 250 people were killed point blank.

It takes a very special kind of evil to open fire on a packed crowd of unarmed civilians at a memorial mass. Their only crime was carrying FRETILIN resistance flag and being Catholic in a muslim majority country.

Before whataboutism accusation, I agree that former colonists should own their mistakes. But equally it is up to a People to take care of their People and not keep pointing to the past for blame.