'History of spying' hampers Singtel's bid

'History of spying' hampers Singtel's bid

SYDNEY (DPA): Pressure on the Australian government to block a bid by government-owned Singapore Telecommunications to buy Australia's second-largest phone company increased Thursday.

The A$14-billion (US$7-billion) offer by SingTel for Cable & Wireless Optus was called into question by claims the Singaporean government would monitor traffic on the defense satellite that Optus manages for the Australian military.

Ross Babidge, former assistant secretary of the Ministry of Defense, said the top brass are worried the political climate in Singapore is such that SingTel executives would willingly spy for their government.

"There are some people who have the view that the Singaporeans almost can't help themselves in some agencies when they get in a situation where they can collect some information - it's almost congenital, they are inclined to do it anyway," Babidge told Australia's ABC Radio.

Babidge said the predisposition of Singaporeans to snoop for their country had made members of the Australian military "uncomfortable in allowing routine access by Singaporeans to defense bases and other installations".

Strategic analyst Des Ball, from the Australian National University, also alleged that Singapore has a long history of spying in Australia.

Ball claimed that Singapore spy planes have operated in Australia and that a double agent was recruited at a sensitive signals listening post.

"There had been earlier evidence going back to the early 1980s that the Singaporeans had already recruited someone... a particular army person was in fact arrested by the Australian Army Intelligence Corp," Ball said.

No one was ever charged.

Defense Minister Peter Reith has declined to comment on what he said are intelligence matters.

Singapore has sought to assure Australians its companies picking up assets in Australia would only be interested in running them for a profit.

In a statement last month, Singapore's Ministry of Finance said the Singapore government "does not interfere in the decisions of SingTel and Singapore Airlines".

The ministry was responding to a claim by Australian media mogul Kerry Stokes, who warned that a program of purchases of service companies like Optus by government-owned Singaporean entities "would not be acceptable to the majority of Australians".

Stokes, owner of the Seven television network, said the Singapore government has been "both traditionally intrusive and overseeing" in its approach to governing and is in "total conflict" with Australia.