Reform and repression
Improved living standards and economic reforms led to pressure for greater political reform and openness, and in April 1991 a 45-member Democracy Forum was launched by leading members of the country's religious and cultural intelligentsia. It was seen as an attempt to ventilate ideas about freedom in politics in what remained an authoritarian state. The government imposed strict limitations on the group's operations.International outrage followed the massacre in November 1991 of 50 Timorese demonstrators by the Indonesian army. The new political openness appeared threatened in 1992 after two students were arrested for taking part in a satirical review mocking the forthcoming elections, and in early 1993 several student publications were shut down.