E&OE
9 May 2008
Doorstop interview, Tokyo
Subjects: Japan, whaling, Fiji, Burma
STEPHEN SMITH: Thanks very much for turning up. I’m very pleased to be in Tokyo for my second visit this year.
Yesterday I had a meeting with my Foreign Minister counterpart, Foreign Minister Koumura, Defence Minister Ishiba and Chief Cabinet Secretary Machimura. And yesterday I also had a very good meeting with Industry and Trade Minister Amari.
So these meetings reflect and underpin the comprehensive economic and strategic and security relationship and partnership that Australia and Japan have. There were a number of things were agreed in the course of yesterday’s meeting with Foreign Minister Koumura.
Firstly, that we would have by the end of this year a ‘2+2’ meeting, which is Australia’s Foreign and Defence Ministers and Japan’s Foreign and Defence Ministers meeting together. This is part of the arrangements that we have under our Joint Security Declaration and Memorandum of Understanding with Japan.
Secondly, we agreed that as part of the G8 meetings we would have a trilateral strategic dialogue – Australia, Japan and the United States – and this will occur in the margins of the G8 Foreign Ministers’ Meeting at the end of June this year.
The third thing we agreed was Japan and Australia are to work together in partnership, not just in Asia, but also in the Pacific. And Australia’s particularly encouraging Japan to play a greater role so far as Overseas Development Assistance is concerned, but also encouraging Japan to play a role as appropriate in peacekeeping arrangements, and Japan, of course, has made a contribution to East Timor.
So these meetings reflect the substantial underpinnings of the relationship between Australia and Japan.
As well, of course, Foreign Minister Koumura and I have discussed whaling. As you know, that’s an issue where there are strong views firmly held, and Australia and Japan have in the past agreed to disagree about whaling. But Foreign Minister Koumura and I agreed that we should try and exhaust diplomatic measures to see if this issue can be brought to a successful conclusion.
Australia, of course, remains of the very strong view that Japan should cease whaling in the Great Southern Oceans, but we will use both bilateral diplomatic means and multilateral diplomatic means through the International Whaling Commission to see whether it’s possible to resolve this disagreement between our two nations.
I’m happy to respond to your questions.
QUESTION: Do you have any update regarding the threat against the High Commissioner in Fiji?
SMITH: I spoke to the High Commissioner last night and he was safe and well. He had relayed to the interim Fiji Government the threat, both to police authorities, and to the government at ministerial level. I’ve had no update this morning, but I will make a point of speaking to the High Commissioner in the course of the day.
The High Commissioner was satisfied with the additional security arrangements that he had put in place and which the Government fully supported. We, of course, are treating the anonymous threat to the High Commissioner very, very seriously. We are pleased that the Fiji police authorities have responded speedily, and indicated an investigation, which is currently under way. We continue to monitor the situation. Any additional security arrangements or facilities or resources that we need to put in place, we will. And this is an issue that Australia takes very, very seriously.
But no one should be under any illusions. If the person who has made this anonymous threat thinks that somehow a threat to our High Commissioner will change Australia’s policy approach, or change the High Commissioner’s discharge of his duties, then they’ve simply got it wrong, they’ve got another thing coming so far as that’s concerned.
QUESTION: Minister, you mentioned your discussions about whaling with the Foreign Minister. Are we to assume from your words that you have told the Japanese that you would not resort to legal means until diplomacy had been exhausted?
SMITH: Our position on possible international legal action remains the same, which is we continue to consider international legal action. We continue to consider that as an option.
But in January I gave an undertaking to Mr Koumura that we would not institute international legal actions without letting the Japanese Government know first. That was our decision, and we’ve now indicated that we’re trying to pursue diplomatic measures to resolve this issue, so obviously we will pursue those.
But our position remains the same, which is we do not discount the possibility of taking international legal action, either before the International Court of Justice or the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea. But if we determine to go down that road, we will advise the Japanese Government first and have a conversation with the Japanese Government first about that.
QUESTION: And that will reflect the judgement at the stage that you could do no more with diplomacy?
SMITH: Well, it will reflect our judgements to whether the taking of international legal action was appropriate or not, was the best thing to do so far as Australia was concerned.
QUESTION: Minister, it’s been reported in Australia that Ian Thorpe will be recruited to help Australia’s whaling envoy to Japan. Can you confirm this?
SMITH: I’ve seen a lot of speculation in Australian media about Australia’s whaling envoy, and the Government will appoint its whaling envoy and announce that at a time of its own choosing.
QUESTION: So you won’t confirm it at this stage?
SMITH: We’ll announce the arrangements so far as Australia’s whaling envoy is concerned at a time of our own choosing.
QUESTION: It’s only a month out from the IWC though. I mean, isn’t part of the job of this whaling envoy to get out there and win countries to Australia’s message before that?
SMITH: We’ve already put before the International Whaling Commission the intercessional meeting in March or April, from memory – I’m happy to stand corrected on the timetable – through Peter Garret, a comprehensive proposal to reform the International Whaling Commission. So we’re quite happy for our delegation to proceed to the International Whaling Commission putting Australia’s point of view, both about whaling and also about reform of the IWC.
Late last year when we announced the array of policy measures we would take to persuade the Japanese Government to cease whaling in the Great Southern Oceans, the appointment of a whaling envoy was one of them, and we will, as I say, announce that at a time of our own choosing.
But understand this: our public policy objective, the objective of the Australian Government and the objective of the Australian people, is to persuade Japan to cease whaling in the Great Southern Oceans. That is our objective, and we will use an array of measures out our disposal in our efforts to try and get to that successful conclusion.
QUESTION: If diplomacy is the main tool by which you do that, is there something which you think the Rudd Government can do that the previous government wasn’t able to do on the diplomatic front?
SMITH: Well, I don’t want to reflect on ten years of complete inactivity, but our view is that the previous government did nothing in respect to this matter, which is why I don’t pay very much attention to the latter day apparent conversion of opposition spokesmen in this respect.
QUESTION: Minister, with the Japanese Government did you discuss about the world food crisis or the shortage of food.
SMITH: Not extensively, but of course the question of food and food security is relevant to our arrangements and relevant to a free trade agreement as agricultural products are a part of those negotiations, but it wasn’t the subject matter that we had extensive conversations about.
The other area, of course, in terms of security that we did speak about in some detail, was the question of energy security and resources security because Australia is a significant, effective, efficient, reliable, cost-effective supplier of both iron ore, for example, and liquefied natural gas.
QUESTION: The Japanese Government is concerned about food export restrictions by Russia or China or other countries, so how do you think–?
SMITH: Well, Australia and Japan are both of the view that pursuing trade liberalisation measures through the WTO, pursuing trade liberalisations regional and bilaterally, are sensible things to do both for Japan and Australia. But it wasn’t the subject of exhausted discussions yesterday at my meeting with either the Foreign Minister or the Trade Minister.
QUESTION: Did you talk to Mr Koumura about the Fijian situation at all?
SMITH: We spoke about Burma, in terms that I outlined in the course of my speech. I also mentioned our very grave concerns about Fiji and indicated that I’d make our Ambassador available to Japanese officials to fully brief Japan on what’s occurring in Fiji. But I gave a very general outline of our concern about our scepticism of the interim Fiji Government moving to an election, our very grave concern about the reprehensible conduct of the Fiji Government in the deportation of the newspaper publishers, and also our very grave concern about the denial of consular access to one of those proprietors, and also very briefly, appraise the Foreign Minister of the circumstances relating to our mission and the High Commissioner. But it was in very general terms. I wanted to do in that way to alert the Foreign Minister to it, but then made the Ambassador available for an extensive briefing of Japanese officials, which the Ambassador will do in the usual way.
QUESTION: So, given Japan’s wide ranging activities and status in the Pacific, do you think they could lend some kind of assistance on the matter of Fiji generally?
SMITH: In the international community there have been a number of nation states who have expressed their very grave concern about the conduct of the Fiji Government, particularly over the deportation and denial of consular access.
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