Asia
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SHIRO ARMSTRONG. More to Australia-Japan security than bilateral defence ties.
Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull is visiting Japan . Whatever else is said, at the top of the agenda in his discussions with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will be managing relations with the United States and China. These are the superpowers that determine and underpin economic, political and national security for Australia and Japan Continue reading »
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GEOFF MILLER. Singapore, Australia, “the Quad” and ASEAN—same same but different!
Singapore and Australia are having to deal with the same set of problems and relationships as the strategic situation in the Asia-Pacific changes. Singapore isn’t a contender for an expanded “Quad” but, as next year’s Chairman of ASEAN, it will have an important role to play in one of the Turnbull Government’s major foreign policy Continue reading »
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DUNCAN GRAHAM. Visit Down Under and pay up.
Indonesians will not be getting cheap and easy-to-obtain Australian visas available to Malaysians and Singaporeans. Australian campaigners seeking better access for Indonesian tourists have been officially told there will be no changes. This is despite the Republic giving Australians free visas-on-arrival and the Australian Government claiming it wants more Indonesian visitors. Continue reading »
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MICHAEL SAINSBURY AND THOMAS ORA. Timor-Leste’s young government teeters on collapse
Asia’s most Catholic country faces the prospect of a second election inside nine months after government fractures Continue reading »
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UCANews. Democracy showdown looms in Malaysia
Approaching elections should act as a safety valve in the multi-ethnic nation. Continue reading »
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RICHARD WOOLCOTT. The Australia – Indonesia Agreement on maintaining security in 1995
The Cabinet papers for 1994/95, released on 1 January this year, made it clear that Paul Keating had sought to develop a security agreement between Australia and Indonesia in 1994. The Agreement was completed in 1995. Continue reading »
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MACK WILLIAMS. Breaking the ice at Pyeongchang?
The decision by the DPRK to reopen high level talks with the ROK next week in preparation for the Winter Olympics is monumental for the ROK. Followed by the US:ROK decision to defer major military exercises at the time of the Games it could well provide an opportunity for informal contacts which could lead eventually Continue reading »
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ANDREW FARRAN. India riding roughshod in commodities trade.
India’s decision on 21 December to slap overnight a 30% tariff increase on Australian imports of lentils and chick peas is just not what a stable, orderly trade system needs. But even so, do we need another discriminatory bilateral so-called ‘free trade’ agreement with yet another country (India) when all these taken together are a Continue reading »
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ALISON BROINOWSKI. War on the cheap.
It’s unlikely that the Army will commission a further report following Albert Palazzo’s account of the ADF’s operations in Iraq. We have years to wait for Professor Craig Stocking’s official history. What Australia urgently needs is a full independent inquiry into our wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria. Continue reading »
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RICHARD BROINOWSKI. Korean Hot Line
Kim Jong-un’s offer to re-open the hotline with South Korea cannot be seen as merely a ploy to wedge ROK and the United States, as so readily claimed last Tuesday by Nikki Haley, United States Ambassador to the United Nations. Continue reading »
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GEORGE WRIGHT. A year of dashed hopes and tyranny in Cambodia
To many, dissolution of the main opposition party caps a year in which the country became a full dictatorship. Continue reading »
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Worries about Malaysia’s ‘Arabisation’ grow as Saudi ties strengthen
Malaysia’s growing ties to Saudi Arabia – and its puritan Salafi-Wahhabi Islamic doctrines – are coming under new scrutiny as concerns grow over an erosion of traditional religious practices and culture in the multi-ethnic nation. A string of recent events has fuelled the concern. Hostility toward atheists, non-believers and the gay community has risen. Continue reading »
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HAMISH MCDONALD. Australia still on smoko over Asia.
When Malcolm Turnbull hosts the ten leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations for an unusual summit in Sydney in March, the Australian public will know virtually nothing about most of them or the current state of affairs in their countries. Continue reading »
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CLIVE KESSLER. Old enemies reconcile as Malaysian elections near.
Malaysia’s fourteenth general elections are looming. This time, almost unprecedentedly, they will see the two great Malay political parties — the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) and the Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS) — working implicitly as allies, not rivals. Continue reading »
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CAVAN HOGUE. More blessed to give than to receive?
Provoking China to score cheap political points domestically does not advance Australian interests. While most Australians would prefer the US domestic political model to the Chinese, we are not going to change the Chinese system and so must learn to live with it. Complaints about Chinese attempts to influence Australian attitudes are naive. All countries, Continue reading »
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ANDREW FARRAN. An alternative perspective for a realistic defence policy for Australia
In defence terms how do we operate in a region where China will by 2030 have a GDP 25 times greater than ours and whose current military expenditure is already 25 times greater, when the US will be concentrating increasingly on issues of its own elsewhere? Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE. Confecting a new China hysteria.
Australia’s diplomacy with its Asian neighbours and contenders has always been awkward. In a similar manner to Britain’s awkward partnering with Europe, so Australia is Asia’s awkward partner. In the past we could calm our fears by relying on great and powerful friends. Those days are over. Australia needs urgently to plan for an independent Continue reading »
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MARGARET BEAVIS. Will the Nobel Peace Prize change Australia’s double speak?
On December 10th the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to ICAN – the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear weapons – which was founded here in Melbourne in 2006. The Nobel Committee made the award “for its work to draw attention to the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons and for its ground-breaking Continue reading »
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ALISON BROINOWSKI. Truth is not an excuse.
If ASIO bugged Mr Huang’s phone, and sat on what it knew, the political timing of the latest leak against Dastyari could not have been more deliberate. Continue reading »
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JAMES O’NEILL. The North Korean situation requires a different policy
It is said that one definition of insanity is to repeat the same process over and over again and expect a different result. That axiom was never truer than when it is applied to United States and Australian policy towards North Korea. Continue reading »
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RICHARD BUTLER. North Korea joins the club
North Korea (DPRK) has made clear that it expects recognition as a nuclear weapon state (NWS). It has now implied, like most existing NWS, that it would follow a policy of “no first use”. US policy continues to be that DPRK nuclear weapon capability must be eliminated, or the DPRK will be. Continue reading »
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FRAN MARTIN. Overstating Chinese influence in Australian universities
Both Australia’s national government and its security agency ASIO have expressed concerns over the influence that the Chinese government exerts on Chinese student groups studying at Australian universities. They have also accused Beijing of using those groups to spy on Chinese students in Australia. Continue reading »
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MARK BEESON: When worlds collide: The unlikely relationship between Australia and China
The debate about Australia’s relationship with China is characterized by a degree of mutual incomprehension born of difference. Both sides share some of the blame for the current bilateral tensions. Continue reading »
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BRUCE DUNCAN. Did Pope Francis succeed in Myanmar?
Myanmar’s neighbours were watching closely the Pope’s visit, worried that the shocking treatment of the Rohingya Muslims could inflame inter-religious conflicts throughout the region. Francis has intervened personally to promote deeper mutual understanding among the major religions, urging them to draw from their traditions to protect those in distress and promote social inclusion and universal Continue reading »
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HUGH WHITE. The White Paper’s grand strategic fix: Can Australia achieve an Indo-Pacific pivot?
By far the most important and sobering part of the 2017 Foreign Policy White Paper is Figure 2.4. It offers the Treasury’s estimates of the sizes of the region’s key economies in 2030. They are calculated in purchasing power parity (PPP) terms, which adjusts for differences in prices and exchange rates to give a more Continue reading »
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CAVAN HOGUE. The White Paper – a curate’s egg?
There is much to be commended in the Government’s White Paper but there are some assumptions which need to be questioned. The focus on Asia is welcome and most of the analysis of our changing world is good, in particular the recognition that the balance between China and the USA has been changing. The Prime Continue reading »
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A whitewash rather than a white paper on how we go to war
The ‘organising principle’ of the 2017 foreign policy White Paper is the importance of and commitment to a rules-based order. At the heart of that order lies the United Nations and “Australia is a principled and pragmatic member of the United Nations, contributing to its vital security, environmental and humanitarian endeavours” (p. 81). In one Continue reading »
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MACK WILLIAMS. 2017 Foreign Policy White Paper : An urgent case for genuine change management !
The White Paper provides a long overdue but commendable assessment of the extensive challenges and opportunities for Australian foreign policy. It should have formed the basis for considered parliamentary debate. Unfortunately, while acknowledging for the first time the extent and pace of change, it offers few new or fresh ideas on how it should be Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE. The complacency of the 2017 Foreign Policy White Paper.
The 2017 White Paper displays, yet again, Australia’s foreign policy complacency, its misplaced middle power imagining, and its awkward partnering in its region. It is a failure as a strategic map for advancing Australia’s security and prosperity in the “Indo-Pacific” region and the world. Continue reading »
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BOB CARR. Foreign Policy White Paper: Faulty roadmap in a GPS world.
While the Australian government’s Foreign Policy White Paper was at the printers, it was being overtaken by events. Continue reading »
