A hard look at Australia's foreign policies

Kel Dummett, Journalist, kel.dummett@rmit.edu.au

As the independence celebrations begin to subside in East Timor, it certainly is timely for Australia to take a sober look at its foreign policy, especially regarding its immediate neighbors. To this end the Australian Government's planned White Paper on foreign policy is welcome.

To avoid another East Timor on the doorstep, Australia must begin to take the lead role as a mediator of conflict in the Asia-Pacific region. Australia must have foreign policies that are sustainable over the long term; that can respond to changing circumstances; and that respect human rights. These were all sadly absent from its policy regarding East Timor. Instead, Australia locked itself into the untenable position of unconditional support of Indonesian sovereignty over East Timor.

This 24-year flawed East Timor policy, not only contributed to the deaths of thousands of Timorese, but also severely damaged the close relationship between Australia and Indonesia.

Many in the Indonesian government saw Australia's sudden policy reversal, from that of total support of Indonesian sovereignty over East Timor and of turning a blind eye to military (TNI) and militia atrocities, to calling for and leading an armed intervention force, as a betrayal.

Numerous writers have written about the failings of Australia's Indonesia policy, particularly regarding East Timor. John Birmingham in Appeasing Jakarta: Australia's complicity in the East Timor Tragedy describes Australia's policy as "appeasement", "lacking in authentic and widespread domestic support" and "unsustainable". He also describes the culture of the Australian Foreign Service, responsible for developing these policies and advising governments, as rigid and hierarchical and "vulnerable to capture by their own mythologies". He says they exhibited the standard practices of "retreating into tunnel vision, the denial of truth (and) refusal to plan for worse case scenarios".

Many in the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs, and in this and former governments, still refuse to admit they and Australia's policies, were wrong. Former Foreign Minister, Gareth Evans, has only recently acknowledged his errors. In Indonesia: My Mistake, an article in the International Herald Tribune, July 2001 he says "I am one of those who has to acknowledge, as Australia's foreign minister at the time, that many of our earlier training efforts [of Indonesian military officers] only helped to produce more professional human rights abusers.

Australia's Foreign Minister, Alexander Downer, however, still refuses to admit that he or his Department knew months before hand, of the planned destruction of East Timor if the referendum vote went in favor of independence. This is despite the fact that their prior knowledge of the atrocities has been exposed on national television by the Australian Army whistleblower, Capt. Plunkett.

Further, the Government still refuses to make public, intelligence information that identifies key TNI and government personnel involved in planning the rape of Timor. It also refuses to support calls for an international war-crimes tribunal investigation into the East Timor atrocities.

In recent years the Australian government has been forced to open its eyes to what is happening in our immediate region, that is, in the Pacific as well as in Southeast Asia. In the past, foreign policy has given the impression that the Pacific did not exist, preferring to direct its attention over the top of the Pacific to Asia, or even further a field to Europe, North America and the Middle East. Now, as some analysts talk of the 'arc of instability' when describing the Pacific region, with conflicts and potential conflicts in PNG, Bougainville, Fiji, Solomons, Australian policy-makers are being forced to pay more attention to the Pacific.

That is not to say that Australia ignores the Pacific, indeed Australia has taken an active role in some Pacific nations. Unfortunately, unlike its recent constructive involvement in the peace negotiations between PNG and Bougainville, Australia's role has not always been constructive. For a number of years Australia provided military support to PNG to wage its war against Bougainville. Australia also pushes the International Monetary Fund's socially and environmentally damaging Restructuring programs to Pacific nations. The Australian government has frequently played the bully-boy role at the Pacific Islands Forum, formerly the South Pacific Forum.

Even more concerning is the fact that the government has not learned from the mistakes of East Timor, and is committing the same errors in relation to our response to the 40 year struggle for justice and self-determination in West Papua or the province of Papua, formerly Irian Jaya.

Australia's foreign policy position regarding West Papua, is just as rigid as the 24 year East Timor policy. A Parliamentary Briefing Paper entitled Is West Papua Another Timor? , states: "Australia made a pragmatic decision a long time ago that it has no choice but to support Indonesia's sovereignty in West New Guinea [West Papua], and this will not change".

Indeed the same comments made by our leaders in the lead up to the devastation of East Timor, are being repeated now regarding West Papua. What Australia's leaders and foreign affairs bureaucrats fail to realize is that independence movements rarely go away. In a recent visit to Australia, the U.S. State Departments policy director, Richard Haas said, "Jakarta will ultimately have to accommodate at least some provincial ambitions for self-government".

Australia's Indonesia policy needs to respect Indonesian sovereignty, but also to recognize Papuan's right to a genuine act of self-determination. Many in the Australian NGO community believe that there is a middle way for foreign policy, in which Australia quietly holds its ground over issues that matter, but handles mutual differences sensitively.