Aussie planes spying on Indonesia: Report
Aussie planes spying on Indonesia: Report
JAKARTA (JP): Australia is conducting secret spy missions
against Indonesia using specially modified PC3 Orion aircraft
operating in international airspace, the Australian Financial
Review reported on Thursday.
The report said that the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF)
Orions were monitoring Indonesian Military and other
communications.
Under the code name "Peacemake", the planes operate under the
cover of RAAF regular maritime reconnaissance flights to the
northwest and north of Australia.
"Today's disclosure of the spy flights is a major national
security embarrassment for the federal government which denies
unauthorized penetration of Indonesian airspace by Australian
aircraft," the newspaper said.
Indonesia has repeatedly claimed that Australia air force
planes have been making interdictions into Indonesian airspace.
Australian officials have repeatedly denied these allegations.
The newspaper quoted a spokesman for the Australian defense
minister, John Moore, on Wednesday evening denying Australian
aircraft had been involved in unauthorized penetration of
Indonesian airspace.
Australian foreign minister Alexander Downer in the past has
attributed reports of Australian secret flights to "people who
resent Australia's intervention in East Timor", it said.
According to the newspaper, indications of the spy operation
emerged first in the British magazine Flight International, which
reported that Australian PC3s had been converted to operate as
intelligence platforms between 1995 and 1998.
Two of the RAAF's 19 PC3 Orions, based at Edinburgh, South
Australia, have been fitted with sophisticated monitoring and
recording equipment by the Defense Signals Directorate to
undertake the operation.
The "disclosure of the flights is perhaps the most
embarrassing security leak since disclosures five years ago of an
Australian-U.S. electronic spying operation against the Chinese
Embassy in Canberra," wrote the Australian Financial Review.
The newspaper also quoted senior Australian government sources
as saying that they fear the disclosure of the spy flights would
prompt Indonesia to take countermeasures to reduce the ability of
the Orions to monitor and record Indonesian Military and other
communications. (mds)