White Paper set off alarm bells

White Paper set off alarm bells

By Anthony Burke

CANBERRA (JP): Many Indonesians will no doubt be aware of the
release last month of Australia's first foreign policy White
Paper, titled In The National Interest.

A masterpiece of British understatement, its aim is to
reassure both the Australian public and our neighbors that there
is a fundamental continuity in Australian diplomacy, that the
nation can continue to be trusted, and that future regional
developments -- political, economic and strategic -- are well in
hand.

Yet the document's calm self-assurance is misleading. Buried
beneath its bland surface are some potentially big surprises,
with which current foreign policy frameworks are ill-equipped to
deal.

The document asserts that the "national interest" will be the
government's "basic test" of foreign policy and that "Australians
should have confidence in Australia's capacity to shape its
future".

Fundamental priorities are unchanged: a desire to shape the
evolving regional security environment and to further the process
of trade liberalization in Asia.

The evolution of these structures, it argues, are essential to
regional stability and hence Australia's own security and well-
being.

As I read it I thought of my experiences while doing research
in Jakarta last year, the warmth and friendliness of everyone I
met and the enormous social contrasts between the daily struggle
of the city's millions of poor and the glittering wealth of the
mall at Kebayoran, dotted with boutiques like Gucci and Armani.

The state of politics seemed to be symbolized by a vast
billboard on an entrance ramp to Jl. Gatot Subroto, showing the
Golkar-ABRI (Armed Forces) family and the development
achievements of the New Order government.

Four months prior to the most bitter election campaign in many
years, there was a potent air of unreality about it all.

Closer to home, I also remember the Indonesian Institute of
Sciences (LIPI)'s Dewi Fortuna Anwar warning me that if
Australia's climate of racial tolerance continued to worsen we
risked being permanently locked out of the region.

Such concerns are obviously high on the Australian
government's agenda, with the White Paper going out of its way to
assure Asians of the government's "unqualified commitment to
racial equality and to eliminating racial discrimination".

Yet I do not believe that Indonesians should be reassured by
such statements.

Asian students in Australia have already reported increasing
harassment and abuse, and Prime Minister Howard himself was
agonizingly slow to condemn the racist agenda of Pauline Hanson.

After Hanson's maiden speech in 1996, he said only that there
was a new spirit of "free speech" in Australia. His refusal to
apologize to Aboriginal people who were stolen from their parents
and the attempts to wind back native title suggest that the
government's commitment to "eliminating racial discrimination" is
mostly rhetoric.

With this has come greater pressure on potential Asian
immigrants and visitors to Australia, with some finding it almost
impossible to obtain visas for even short stays.

Indonesians would be wrong to see an upside to the
government's refusal to grant asylum to some 1,300 East Timorese
refugees. Their cases are becoming a new flash point for anti-
Indonesian sentiment, with student groups and the Catholic Church
willing to risk imprisonment by offering sanctuary to Timorese
denied residency.

Growing media interest has already brought Indonesia poor
publicity. This increase in anti-Indonesian feeling could be
avoided if the refugees were quietly processed and absorbed into
the Australian community.

Indonesia is of course listed as one of Australia's most
important bilateral relations. Alongside gratitude for
Indonesia's constructive role in the region, the White Paper
strikes an almost imperceptible note of alarm.

The bilateral relationship, it says, will "require careful
management as Indonesia faces a leadership transition after two
decades of growth and social change.

"In these circumstances, continuing economic liberalization,
political stability and continuity in foreign policy are not
necessarily assured over the next 15 years, although they are
clearly in the interests not only of Indonesia but also Australia
and the region."

Beneath these polite words I hear the rumblings of an
earthquake. Among many officials and analysts there is increasing
despair over the current political stalemate in Indonesia.

While the President and the ABRI leadership appear to have a
firm grip on any opposition, there are no meaningful efforts to
narrow the vast "social gap" that is generating so much
frustration.

Analysts fear the myriad incidents of violence prior to and
during the election campaign portend an explosion. Their fears
are compounded by the increasing concentration of power close to
the presidential palace and the refusal to consider reforms or
initiate any mechanisms for a stable transition.

Yet while countries like the United States and Britain are
visibly hedging their bets and developing links with the
opposition and other government critics, Australia has left all
its eggs in the Soeharto-ABRI basket.

With this has come a reluctance to raise human rights
concerns, despite the White Paper's insistence that "promoting
and protecting human rights underpins Australia's broader
security and economic interests". One does not have to go as far
as "posturing" to press a little harder in this area.

At the same time the bipartisan approach to Indonesia has
broken down. Last year, the Labor spokesman for foreign affairs,
Laurie Brereton, argued that "the emergence of an indigenous
democracy movement in Indonesia is a critical development of
potentially far-reaching significance" and hoped that "a role can
be found for this movement in the political process".

He warned that Australians should not "assume a necessary
congruence between the interests of any group, including the
Soeharto government, with the interests of both Indonesia and
Australia".

Private discussions with Labor members also suggest that a
lack of improvement in East Timor means that Indonesia can no
longer assume the same level of support for its position there.

Obviously a positive and friendly relationship between
Indonesia and Australia is of fundamental importance and the
growing people-to-people links are adding real depth and warmth
to it.

The many levels of links between our two countries, and the
complexities in Indonesia's political future, mean that
identifying the "national interest" is no longer so easy.

As the political crisis deepens it will require a great deal
of imagination on both sides to ensure that the relationship does
not go the way of Indonesia's hard-won stability.

The writer is a lecturer at the Department of Political
Science, Australian National University.