E&OE
30 March 2009
Interview on Sky News
Subjects: Conference on Afghanistan, China
NEWSREADER: A major international summit on Afghanistan gets underway in The Hague this week. It will give the US an opportunity to promote its new strategy for the war-torn country and encourage other countries to commit more troops.
Australia's Foreign Minister, Stephen Smith, will attend the conference, and he joins us now from Perth. He's speaking to Sky News political editor, David Speers.
REPORTER: Stephen Smith, thank you for your time. Before we get to Afghanistan, can I ask you about this breaking news on Pakistan - another attack in Lahore, this time against a police training facility, as we just saw.
Do you know any more about this and what's your reaction?
SMITH: Well, I've only just seen the report myself, so I'm not in a position to give any additional information. But like the attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team, effectively this looks like very much an attack upon Pakistan itself.
And this is one of the points that Australia has been making over the last few months, that the terrorist and extremist activity in Pakistan is not just limited to the Pakistan-Afghanistan border area; it is very much a serious attack upon Pakistan.
I was there recently and it's quite clear that Pakistan needs all the assistance it can get from the international community, including Australia, not just on security matters but also on economic and social matters.
So it looks like very much to me another effective attack on the institutions of the Pakistan state. It just underlines the fact that Pakistan needs as much support as it can get from the international community.
REPORTER: Well, of course, just on that, Pakistan and Afghanistan are intrinsically linked in terms of finding a solution in that part of the world. The original reason for invading Afghanistan in 2001, of course, was because it was harbouring, sheltering al-Qaeda.
Do you now concede that that is what is happening in Pakistan as well, that it may not be sanctioned by the government there but there is harbouring of al-Qaeda within Pakistan's borders?
SMITH: It's not so much a matter of conceding that. I mean, Australia has been saying for some time that there are grave difficulties caused, so far as the effort against extreme in Afghanistan is concerned, by the fact of cross-over into Pakistan because of the very porous nature of the Afghanistan-Pakistan border area.
We've been saying for some time that when we think about Afghanistan, we also have to think about Pakistan. So coordination between Afghanistan and Pakistan, coordination between those two nation states and NATO and International Security Assistance Force, and the international community, is obviously very, very important.
But the point that I make is that we also have to consider Pakistan in its own right, and that was very much the focus of my visit there recently.
But what we do certainly know is that the Afghanistan-Pakistan border area continues to be the hotbed of international terrorism. That's where the threat emanates to Australia, to Europe and to the rest of the international community. That's been the source of recent attacks, whether it was the Sri Lankan cricket team or earlier into Europe. That has very serious adverse consequences for Australians and Australia, and that's why Australia is playing its role as part of the international community effort to try and stare down al-Qaeda and extremist Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
REPORTER: Well, just on that, you're off, of course, to The Hague shortly for the summit this week on Afghanistan.
What will you be saying about Australia's willingness to send more troops to Afghanistan?
SMITH: It's a very important international conference. It's hosted by the Netherlands, by my colleague Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen, who was in Australia recently. It's sponsored by the United Nations.
I think there are three important points to make about it. Firstly, for the first time there's been a deliberate effort made to invite not just NATO and International Security Assistance Force countries like Australia and the United Arab Emirates, but also to invite regional countries, the regional players, including Iran.
This underlines the point that what we have here a threat to the region, to South Asia, to Central Asia, as well as to the international community generally.
Secondly, I think the focus will be not so much on additional troop numbers but on the need, as Australia's been saying for some time and as President Obama's review said over the weekend, this has to be not just a military enforcement effort; it has to be a civilian nation-building or capacity-building or civilian reconstruction effort. And it also has to include at some point a political dialogue amongst the Afghanistan political leadership.
And finally, I think there'll be a very fair focus...
REPORTER: Yes, but President Obama's - President Obama's made it pretty clear he wants his allies to commit more troops.
SMITH: I'll happily come to that.
But finally, I think the key thing will be, which we've started with here, is a realisation that there is also a need to address very carefully what's occurring in Pakistan.
The United States review, President Obama's review, makes it clear that they're looking to the international community for additional contributions. We as yet have not received a formal request by the United States for an additional troop contribution. But as the Prime Minister has said, as I have said, when we receive that - and it'll be no surprise if we do receive it - when we receive such a request, we'll consider that on its merits. But we certainly won't allow any request of us, of Australia, to be used by other nation states as a reason or an excuse to not make their own appropriate contribution.
But I underline this point...
REPORTER: Yeah, but why do you have to wait for that request? Why do you have to wait for that request, Minister? Surely the US has made its position clear. It's adopting a strategy you agree with. Can't you make a decision on its own merits, on Australia's own national interests, as to whether we need to commit more troops without waiting for the US to ask us?
SMITH: Well, precisely for the reason that we're acting in Australia's national interest. We obviously have had a look, a preliminary look at the US review. We think it mirrors and echoes what Australia's been saying for sometime, that there needs to be both a military, civilian nation-building reconstruction effort and a political dialogue. It also needs to look at the implications for Pakistan.
But we will, in our own time, carefully assess that. If and when a request comes we will, again, carefully assess that in the context of our national interest. We continue to very strongly hold the view that it is in Australia's national interest to make a contribution to Afghanistan, because that is the current hotbed of international terrorism and that poses very grave risks to Australia and Australians.
REPORTER: Okay. A couple of opinion polls today showing that 50 per cent of Australians want our troops withdrawn. Do you concede that you may not be winning the public relations war on Afghanistan?
SMITH: Well I've seen reference to that. I haven't looked at it closely. But can I just say generally, it's no surprise to me that after two deaths in one week, Corporal Hopkins and Sergeant Till, that Australians will recoil in horror. It's a terrible tragedy for the families. It's a terrible tragedy for Australia.
But the point that the Government makes is the consequences of leaving, or the consequences of retreat would be far worse than the consequences of staying. So it's no surprise that people will express concern.
It's also, of course, just a matter of commonsense and general instinct that the Australian starting point would be to resolve matters without the use of military enforcement action.
If I asked a question, would Australians prefer that matters were resolved peacefully and civilly, rather than through military enforcement action, of course they'll respond by saying peacefully and civilly.
The problem we have in Afghanistan and Pakistan, is that some people don't want to have a conversation about the peaceful and civil resolution of matters. They want to deal with things through the barrel of a gun, because they're hardcore extremists and terrorists.
REPORTER: Minister, before we go, I did want to ask you about a separate matter. The Universities of Cambridge and Toronto published reports over the weekend which claimed that a cyber-spy network is being run mostly based in China, targeting Tibetan exile groups and even hacking computers based in Australia at two Foreign Embassies here in Canberra.
How do you react to this and how do you characterise China's approach to intelligence gathering?
SMITH: Well firstly, I'm not proposing to discuss the detail of those suggestions, or that report. I never comment publicly on such details of intelligence, or security matters.
Suffice to say people should understand very clearly that the Australian Government, both now and in the past, spend a considerable amount of time, effort and resources ensuring that our own intelligent and national security communications are protected. And we spend a lot of time and effort making sure that everything we can do is done to protect the security of our own communications by computer, or any other mechanism.
And...
REPORTER: Your predecessor Alexander Downer - your predecessor Alexander Downer's quoted in The Australian today as saying China is the main culprit for hacking into the computers of foreign countries. Is he right?
SMITH: Well I'm not proposing to comment on the actions of any one individual country. And my predecessor Mr Downer wouldn't have done that when he was Foreign Minister either. He now has the luxury of being a private citizen.
Suffice to say that of course Australia, the Australian Government is well aware that not being very careful about your communications, not being very careful about the security of your intelligence and national security information, does put you at risk. And we take every step to ensure that our national security and our national interests are not put at risk, by devoting a lot of resources, a lot of time and a lot of effort, to protect those very important communications.
REPORTER: Foreign Minister Stephen Smith, thank you.
SMITH: Thanks very much. Thanks.
[Ends]
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