Transcript E&OE
22 September 2009
Interview with Michael Brissenden, ABC 7.30 Report
Subjects: United Nations General Assembly - US engagement, agenda, relevance.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN: Stephen Smith this is the first General Assembly that President Obama will be addressing, in your discussion with others around this meeting have you noticed a sense of expectation about the address?
STEPHEN SMITH: There's certainly very much a welcoming sense of occasion. It's the first engagement of the United Nations by the Obama Administration. There's generally a view that it's the first real positive engagement by a US Administration since the Bush years. So that's a very good thing. It sets a tone. And the fact that the President is also making his interventions in areas that have been Australian priorities is also a very good thing for Australia: climate change, non-proliferation and disarmament. So having the United States fully engaged in the United Nations is a very good thing in Australia's interests but it's also a good thing in the interests of the international community.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN: And is it sending the signal that clearly there is a change of emphasis from this Administration about the United Nations and multilateral engagement generally? Is that the sort of signal that is already getting through?
STEPHEN SMITH: I think so. But it's also reinforcing and underlining a point that the Australian government has been making for some time, which is one of the reasons we're active regionally and active multilaterally, not just in the United Nations but in other international institutions, is that every major problem we see in the modern day can't be adequately responded to or responded to at all by one country acting alone. Whether it's climate change, whether it's nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament, whether it's transnational crime, whether it's international terrorism, whether it's people smuggling, pandemics and disaster relief.
No one country can deal with these things alone. You can only make progress by acting together, regionally or multilaterally. And that's the real signal that it sends and that's why so much Australian foreign policy in our time of Government has been dedicated to ...
[Break for technical problem]
No one country acting alone can deal with these matters. And that's why the Australian Government has been spending so much of its time engaging regionally and also engaging multilaterally within the United Nations, but also other multilateral institutions. Including of course the G20 which has now become in our view the premier vehicle for dealing with global economic matters.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN: In fact there was a view progressed very much by the Bush Administration that the UN had become something of an antiquated institution. I think George Bush referred to them as addressing a wax museum. Is it true that the fact that it has been around so long there are other emerging institutions like the G20 that it makes the United Nations perhaps less relevant?
STEPHEN SMITH: I don't think so. But I have been making the point, Australia's been making the point that the United Nations does need to reflect the modern day, the modern world. It is an institution which in its structures reflects the 1940s and 1950s. We've been saying for example that we really should have reform of the Security Council so that the Security Council reflects the modern day. We for example have said in a reformed Security Council a country like Japan would be a permanent member of a Security Council. A country like India would be a permanent member of a Security Council.
So the United Nations is in need of reform at the Security Council level and other areas. But our view, our strong view has always been there's no point throwing the baby out with the bath water. It's the only international institution that we have which encompasses all. It's the only international institution which has the lawful authority to deal with peace and security matters, either in an enforcement sense under Chapter VII of the Charter, or in a peace and security and peacekeeping sense under Chapter VI of the Charter.
So it's the only institution that has the lawful authority to impose itself. And that's one of the reasons we're committed to it, and one of the reasons for example why we strongly lay a claim to becoming a temporary member of the Security Council to discharge our aspirations for peace and security and peacekeeping but also to discharge our obligation in those areas.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN: And if your successful your hope to effect some change in the relevance of that institution?
STEPHEN SMITH: Absolutely. But we will continue to make the point as we have done in our period in office that the institution itself is in need of some reform. But if you believe an institution is in need of reform there's no point as our opponents did walking outside the building and throwing rocks at the windows. You're best off being actively engaged at the highest level you can. And in our case that's as a temporary member of the Security Council.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN: You've got some good stiff competition for this, the Finns and Luxembourg. They're a pretty top level group. How's it going? How's the campaign going?
STEPHEN SMITH: Finland and Luxembourg are very healthy competitors. One of the problems for us is that because of the attitude that our predecessors took we're very late in the field, so we've got a lot of catching up to do. But we've done in our view well in the first instance in creating a good impression.
We are seen as being a different Government with different values and different virtues. The Apology resonated throughout the international community. Our ratification of Kyoto resonated throughout the international community. Our very clear desire to want to engage has also resonated. And our view, our very strong view, that whilst our priorities remain our region, remain the Asia Pacific, our interests are necessarily global. And so our acknowledgement that we need to enhance our engagement in Africa, in Latin and South America, in parts of Europe that previously we had no great contact with, this is also acknowledged as an Australia that wants to play its part in the world as a significant and considerable nation, which we are.
Whilst we're only a country of 21 million in population; we're in the top 15 in terms of prosperity, income per capita; we're in the top 15 in terms of the size of our economy; and we're in the top dozen when it comes to peacekeeping and defence spend or expenditure. We are a significant and considerable nation and we should conduct ourselves like one. And we should be proud of taking our values and our virtues and our uniqueness to the world. Which is what we're doing generally but also what we're doing in our Security Council campaign.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN: Do you think that the time, the effort and the considerable resources could be spent in a better way which is what your critics attest?
STEPHEN SMITH: Our critics are small in number and I think its expenditure which is well worth committing ourselves to. But there are also things which we are doing which transcends the Security Council campaign. Yes it's three off, 2012 for the 2013-2014 term but for example our engagement with Africa is something which transcends that.
We're a country of 21 million people, we've become prosperous by being a great trading nation. Africa is a continent of nearly a billion people of over 50 countries, where the economic complementarities are very stark: minerals and petroleum resources, agriculture, and environmental management issues.
There is a lot in the economic complementarity between Australia and Africa. As a trading country of 21 million people we can't afford to neglect or ignore a continent of a billion people. And that's what Australian foreign policy has done for a considerable period of time. So it's in our economic interest long term and in our strategic interest's long term to engage with Africa. Not just one or two countries in Africa.
The same is true of our lack of engagement with South America. The countries of South America have historically looked to the north, to the United States and to Europe. Now they are looking east and west to Africa, to Asia and to the Pacific. And so they see Australia.
Again there is a lot of opportunities long term: economic, social and strategic opportunities with the countries of South America that transcend any short term Security Council campaign.
[ENDS]
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