PM minister never expected Megawati at Bali memorial
PM minister never expected Megawati at Bali memorial
Agencies, Sydney, Australia
Australian Prime Minister John Howard said on Friday he never expected Indonesian President Megawati Soekarnoputri to attend this weekend's anniversary commemorations for the Bali nightclub bombings.
Leading up to Sunday's anniversary of the attacks that killed 202 people there were reports that Megawati would not attend out of respect for the tropical island's mostly Hindu population.
"There are complex cultural reasons, which I fully understand," he told Sydney radio station 2SM. "I don't read anything into it."
The Indonesian government confirmed earlier this week that Megawati would not attend, but said it was because of a prior engagement with the president of Algeria.
Foreign Minister Alexander Downer insisted her absence was not a sleight on Australia.
"Different cultures deal with these commemorations in different ways - we in the way that we all understand and I don't think President Megawati necessarily wants to deal with it in the same way," Downer told Australian Broadcasting Corp. television late on Thursday.
Howard said he was not concerned for his safety when he travels to Bali to attend the memorial services.
"You've got to take risks and I certainly am not concerned about my safety," he said. "I don't think it's in any way broken our spirit or affected us in a long term way. We'll still travel, we'll still seek out adventure, we'll still see our young going abroad."
Howard also said on Friday he would simply ignore a series of barbs about Australia from his Malaysian counterpart Mahathir Mohamad, saying the veteran leader personally had a long-standing problem with Canberra.
At a regional conference in Bali this week, Mahathir slammed Australia as "some sort of transplant from another region" and accused Canberra of wanting to be the regional "deputy sheriff" to Washington.
"I've long since given up dignifying his comments with a response," Howard said on national radio. "I'm not the only prime minister who had a run-in with Dr Mahathir.
"It's better to let it just slide away because he's now retiring. Sometimes it's more evocative, and it's more eloquently expressive of how you feel, by ignoring something, than to get into a detailed rebuttal."
Howard said relations with the Malaysian people remained strong, and pointed out that 200,000 Malaysians had been through Australian universities.