E&OE
15 April 2009
Interview with Jim Middleton on Australia Network
Subjects: Fiji, Bali process, US-China relations
JIM MIDDLETON: Regional conflict and people smuggling go hand in hand. The deteriorating security in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, along with the Burmese regime's treatment of its Rohingya minority have led to an upsurge in asylum seeker numbers.
Just today another boatload was detected off Ashmore Reef to Australia's north. Their apprehension coincided with a regional ministerial conference in Bali to review efforts to combat people smuggling and to manage asylum seekers.
Stephen Smith is Australia's Foreign Minister and he co-chaired the meeting with his Indonesian counterpart, Hassan Wirajuda.
Stephen Smith, thanks very much for joining us from Bali.
STEPHEN SMITH: Pleasure, Jim.
JIM MIDDLETON: First to Fiji where things appear to be going from very bad to much worse. Our own reporter, Sean Dorney, has been thrown out. Local reporters are being intimidated. The Radio Australia transmitter has been shut down. The governor of the Central Bank's been sacked and the military regime's trying to block the internet.
This could pave the way, could it not, for repression as grievous as that in Zimbabwe?
STEPHEN SMITH: Well, we'll have to wait and see but nothing that's occurred in the last few days in Fiji fills me with anything other than pessimism - pessimism for potentially very adverse outcomes, pessimism for the people of Fiji, pessimism for their social and economic circumstances.
We, of course, absolutely condemn what's effectively been the self-imposition of military dictatorship, the throwing over of the judiciary, the abrogation of the constitution, the expulsion and intimidation of journalists, the vetting of communications from outside Fiji, either by radio transmitter or by internet. All of these things are the actions of a regime which is becoming increasingly isolated. And that runs the very grave risk of Fiji's social and economic circumstances for its people seriously deteriorating even further.
JIM MIDDLETON: The economy is, as you say, in very poor shape but that also creates something of a dilemma for countries like Australia. If you tighten sanctions further, that would make things more difficult, would hurt the local population.
But it will also give the military regime the chance to point the finger at Australia and accuse it of being the cause of the deterioration.
STEPHEN SMITH: Which is why our sanctions regime has been aimed at the regime itself and effected in a way which we aim and desire not to have adverse impacts for the people of Fiji themselves.
So we have travel sanctions against members of the regime. We have limits or restrictions on ministerial contact. But we continue to ply and apply, for example, humanitarian assistance to the people of Fiji, and the aftermath of the recent floods is an example. We've discontinued our military or defence contact.
So we're obviously in discussion with the international community about what more, if anything, can be done either by our colleagues in the Pacific Island Forum or our colleagues in the Commonwealth or in the international community generally.
But Australia has been, together with New Zealand, at the forefront of the sanctions. But our objective is to try and bring the regime to account, not to hurt the people of Fiji.
But my very real concern is one thing we have seen, since Commodore Bainimarama came to power, is a very severe deterioration in the social and economic circumstances of Fiji for the Fijian people.
In the face of a global economic crisis, that could only be compounded. And in the face of the actions of the regime, it will only be massively aggravated and multiplied.
JIM MIDDLETON: Is it coming close to a time when you would advise foreign nationals to get out? And does your government have contingency plans to get Australian citizens out if that's deemed necessary?
STEPHEN SMITH: Well, we're of course monitoring developments very carefully. Our travel advice for Fiji remains to exercise caution, particularly if one is in Suva, if you like, the political capital of Fiji, but we do make the point in our travel advice that political circumstances can change very quickly. But for the present, we simply say to people to exercise caution.
One of the great attractions, economically and socially, of Fiji is as a tourist destination and not just Australians but many international visitors continue to go to Fiji. But we keep our travel advice under very close and careful review. It's effectively reviewed on an ongoing basis and as circumstances change, if they do, that may well change.
But for the present, we simply advise people to exercise a high degree of caution if they are in Fiji.
JIM MIDDLETON: Now, you've been in Bali discussing people smuggling just as, it turns out, another boat has turned up off Ashmore Reef to Australia's north. What does that say about the effectiveness of efforts to control people smuggling?
STEPHEN SMITH: Well, we've had about a dozen boat arrivals carrying 400-odd people over the last 12 months or so. And the arrivals was one of the reasons why Australia was very keen to see, for the first time in a half a dozen years, a ministerial conference at the Bali Process, just as in the same manner Indonesia was keen to see a ministerial conference because of the Rohingyas problem.
To us it very much reflects the ongoing difficulty. Circumstances have changed in some respects quite dramatically since 2002-2003 when the Bali Process conference last met at ministerial level.
Some of the push factors have abated: for example, Iraq. But some of the other push factors have increased and in some cases dramatically. Afghanistan and Sri Lanka fall immediately to mind. The Afghanistan-Pakistan area falls to mind as a potential area of exodus by people.
So we know we are confronting these issues and these difficulties. We also know a range of other things. We have to have our border protection effected in a manner which maximises the prospects of the unlawful arrivals not reaching our mainland.
And the most recent arrival has been at Ashmore Reef. They'll be taken to Christmas Island and processed and it's a qualitatively different way in which they're processed under our immigration laws than if they had arrived at the mainland.
But secondly, and this is really the point of the conference, we can only do this in conjunction with our neighbours, in the first instance, Indonesia, but with other countries as well.
JIM MIDDLETON: Finally and briefly, you were in Washington recently for talks with Hillary Clinton and Robert Gates. How concerned is the Australian Government that Washington seems more concerned about, or more worried about, low intensity conflicts like Afghanistan, for example, rather than the potential strategic risk of China as it grows as an economic and also military power in the decades ahead?
STEPHEN SMITH: Well, we know this is the century of the Asia-Pacific. It's not just the emergence of China; it's the emergence of China, the emergence of India, the emergence of the ASEAN economies combined. And as, for example, China grows so will its economic capacity, so will its capacity for influence in the region.
One of the things that Australia always raises with China has been the transparency of its military modernisation.
So the emergence of China as a responsible stakeholder is a very key issue in this century. And fundamentally central to that is the relationship between the United States and China. I urged the Secretary of State to ensure, or help ensure, that the United States and China have a first class relationship.
Certainly what we've seen so far, not just the visit by Secretary of State Clinton to our region, to Japan, Korea, China and Indonesia, but also President Obama meeting with Hu Jintao in the margins of the G-20 in London. So that relationship is absolutely essential.
Of course, in the meantime, there are some very difficult issues that we confront together: the war in Afghanistan; the difficulties on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border area; and the problems and the difficulties that these cause us as the current hotbed of international terrorism.
And some of the corollary or collateral consequences of that is people movement and people displacement. And that's one of the consequences that we've seen in Australia with recent arrivals over the last 12 months or so, and one of the issues that's very central to the very successful Bali Ministerial Conference that we've just completed.
JIM MIDDLETON: Stephen Smith, thanks again for your time.
STEPHEN SMITH: Thanks very much, Jim. Thank you.
[ENDS]
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