Timor is the principal island of the Outer Banda Arc, which is being uplifted by arc-continent collision with the Australian continent.

It occupies a forearc position in front of the active volcanic arc that forms the islands in the Flores region to the north.

Jurassic marine shoreface and turbidite sands of the Plover and Militia Formations are proven reservoirs in the North Australian Shelf.

Timor-Leste is divided into thirteen municipalities, which in turn are subdivided into 65 administrative posts, 442 sucos (villages), and 2,225 aldeias (hamlets).

The natural vegetation was tropical dry broadleaf forests with an undergrowth of shrubs and grasses supporting a rich wildlife[citation needed].

During the Pleistocene epoch, Timor was the abode of extinct giant monitor lizards similar to the Komodo dragon.

Frog species in Timor include Duttaphrynus melanostictus, Hoplobatrachus tigerinus, Limnonectes timorensis, Litoria everetti, and Polypedates leucomystax.

[21] The earliest historical record about Timor island is the 13th-century Chinese Zhu Fan Zhi, where it is called Ti-wu and is noted for its sandalwood.

As the nearest island with a European settlement at the time, Timor was the destination of William Bligh and seamen loyal to him following the infamous mutiny on the Bounty in 1789.

It was also where survivors of the wrecked HMS Pandora, sent to arrest the Bounty mutineers, landed in 1791 after that ship sank in the Great Barrier Reef.

Although Portugal was neutral during World War II, in December 1941, Portuguese Timor was occupied by Australian and Dutch forces, which were expecting a Japanese invasion.

This Australian military intervention dragged Portuguese Timor into the Pacific War but it also slowed the Japanese expansion.

When the Japanese did occupy Timor, in February 1942, a 400-strong Dutch-Australian force and large numbers of Timorese volunteers engaged them in a one-year guerrilla campaign.

After the allied evacuation in February 1943 the East Timorese continued fighting the Japanese, with comparatively little collaboration with the enemy taking place.

This assistance cost the civilian population dearly: Japanese forces burned many villages and seized food supplies.

The subsequent internal unrest and fear of the communist Fretilin party led to an invasion by Indonesia, who opposed the concept of an independent East Timor.

The people of East Timor, through Falintil the military wing of Fretilin, resisted 35,000 Indonesian troops in a prolonged guerrilla campaign, but the whole island remained under Indonesian control until a referendum held in 1999 under a UN-sponsored agreement between Indonesia and Portugal in which its people rejected the offer of autonomy within Indonesia.

The UN then temporarily governed East Timor until it became independent as Timor-Leste in 2002 under the presidency of Falintil leader Xanana Gusmão.

[22] However, there is no real evidence that the people of West Timor, most of whom are ethnically Atoni, the traditional enemy of the East Timorese, have any interest in such a union.