India-Australia News and Discussion

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Post by Pete »

Rye

I see uranium as tribute to China and Russia as a significant reason but the Left shafting the US deal AND Australian uranium exports as the major reason.

As I said I think the major reason that Australia didn't export to India was your left in Parliament blocking the pivotal US deal. It seems Australia offer to export was only open while our Coalition Government was in power. Time ran out.

When the Labor Government come to power in Australia in Nov 07 our Left blocked the sale.

Unfairly India needed to pass the NPT test in the eyes of our Left while our Left had no problem exporting to (old Left countries) Russia and China.

China orchestrating your Left and our Left springs to mind but that is a "politically incorrect" view here.

The underlying problem (I think) is that uranium is rationed out as a political commodity rather than sold to the highest bidders at shifting daily prices like oil.

I've heard that the combined profit for Australian companies exporting uranium is only US$40 milllion suggesting that politics is more important than price.

Pete
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Post by archan »

Pete,
I just want to point out that though the Indian Left played a big role in blocking the N-deal, it was not as if there was/is a consensus in India in favor of the deal. If the deal was so good and had support from a majority of people, the left would have not been able to block it. India, as of now is not willing to give up what is being asked in return for the deal.
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Post by Pete »

archan wrote:Pete,
I just want to point out that though the Indian Left played a big role in blocking the N-deal, it was not as if there was/is a consensus in India in favor of the deal. If the deal was so good and had support from a majority of people, the left would have not been able to block it. India, as of now is not willing to give up what is being asked in return for the deal.
I recognise that and would agree that the US should not be allowed to overly compromise India's hardwon nuclear weapons and reactor capability.

I'd add that our (Australia's) Coalition Government should have secured bipartisan support from Labor for selling to India before Australia made its conditional offer to India in July 2007 http://spyingbadthings.blogspot.com/200 ... istan.html .

Overall our Labor Government appears to be laying out the red carpet for China while neglecting good relations with India. Once our PM Rudd (only half jokingly referred to as the "Mandarin Candidate") finishes his trip to China (later this month) he may remember India was/is a better ally and also has the money to buy Australian resources...

Pete
(from Australia)
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Post by Karan Dixit »

Rudd is being heavily bribed by Chinese. I am surprised that Aussies are not taking any action against him.

Don't they have a system of impeachment or no confidence vote?
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Post by Pete »

Karan Dixit wrote:Rudd is being heavily bribed by Chinese. I am surprised that Aussies are not taking any action against him.

Don't they have a system of impeachment or no confidence vote?
I think your theories are somewhat simplistic. In any case we have no impeachment process just our Governor General sacking a PM process (a la Kerr sacking Whitlam in 1975). The ruling Labour Party could dump him as PM - however he is their shining star who has just won an election.

Rudd appears to have made a calculation that China is the future supreme Asian power. He may be proven correct.

However Rudd's long term concentration on China (for the last 25 years) may have blinkered his views making him forgetful of the importance of India and Japan.

Chinese bribes? Rudd has the advantage that he can't be bribed by anyone (a true strength) as his wife has a private fortune of around US$50 million.

Pete
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Post by Rye »

archan wrote:
If the deal was so good and had support from a majority of people, the left would have not been able to block it.
The left won only about two dozen seats, but their support is necessary for the life of this ruling leftist UPA coalition. If the INC leadership wanted to sign up and lose the government, the could do it today, but I would like to see the politician/party that will willingly give up power when it has ways to avoid it.
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Post by vsudhir »

Rye wrote:archan wrote:
If the deal was so good and had support from a majority of people, the left would have not been able to block it.
The left won only about two dozen seats, but their support is necessary for the life of this ruling leftist UPA coalition. If the INC leadership wanted to sign up and lose the government, the could do it today, but I would like to see the politician/party that will willingly give up power when it has ways to avoid it.
Minor quibble.

The left has 60 MPs in parliament. Thats 5 dozen MPS and 10%+ of parliamentary strength in the LS.

Scary to think what else could've gone wrong under their arm-twisting as if enough stalling, deceiving and looting hasn't happened already. The chinis know this kinda leverage is seldom afforded in New Delhi. The next election will almost surely see a drop in commie LS strength.
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Post by Karan Dixit »


Climate change threatens Australia's koala - report


http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?fi ... rldupdates

--------------

On a separate not:

Pete 50 million dollars is not much. If that is all he has then Rudd is a soft target for bribery.
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Post by Pete »

Karan

I reckon this story may interest you http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/ ... e=fullpage - about Indian nuclear scientists being prevented from visiting Australia.

BTW how does one use the URL button on Bharat Rakshak? I've figured it out on all other fora.

Pete
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Post by Gerard »

Rudd Bush salute irks Australians
Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has been criticised by opponents after greeting US President George W Bush with a playful military-style salute.
One broadcaster suggested Mr Rudd was acting like Mr Bush's "deputy sheriff" while political opponents described the gesture as "unbecoming".
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Post by Karan Dixit »

Gerard wrote:Rudd Bush salute irks Australians
Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has been criticised by opponents after greeting US President George W Bush with a playful military-style salute.
One broadcaster suggested Mr Rudd was acting like Mr Bush's "deputy sheriff" while political opponents described the gesture as "unbecoming".
I think Rudd is confused who his boss is, Panda #1 or Bush Junior.
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Post by Rahul Shukla »

Japan, India deserve permanent seats in UNSC: Australia (Daily Times)[quote]SYDNEY: Japan and India deserve permanent seats in the UN Security Council, Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said on Sunday, stressing that Canberra should also play a greater role in world affairs.

He said the newly elected government of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd wanted to see the United Nations modernise by broadening the council’s permanent membership beyond Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States. “We think the permanent membership should be changed to reflect the modern reality, having on the permanent membership Japan, for example, and India,â€
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Post by Raja Ram »

The more one thinks of this permanent membership of the security council, especially as the defanged membership the existing P 5 offer, one is reminded of Gandhiji's words dismissing the Cripps mission.

He said, "it is like a post dated cheque issued on a crashing bank. I wouldn't touch it with a pair of tongs."

When such statements are issued by an insolvent in the global power stakes like Australia, what can one say :roll:
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Post by davidn »

Karan Dixit wrote:Rudd is being heavily bribed by Chinese. I am surprised that Aussies are not taking any action against him.

Don't they have a system of impeachment or no confidence vote?
I think you'll find that in most democratic countries it takes far more than just a short sighted and narrowly focused foreign policy(which the common man doesn't particularly care much about) to impeach a head of state... Perhaps in your world things are different.
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Post by Gerard »

Whether or not he is Australian is irrelevant.

A random, scandalous, news report that has no bearing on either Indian-Australian relations or Australian strategic affairs doesn't belong on the thread.

Only in the Paki thread are these sorts of stories relevant.
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Post by Jay »

pandyan wrote:
Jay wrote: Whats this got to do with the discussion? Limit the posts to relevant material. Karan & Pandyan, please reconsider the posted link.
hello mite...you from asstralia?
No....
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Post by Karan Dixit »

It was not my intention to take delight in that story. I was simply posting a news story. It was sort of a disturbing story. That is why I added a note of caution at the bottom of the link.

I will definitely remove the link. But once again, it was simply a news item and I did not know where else to post it.
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China asks Australia to keep away from its 'internal affairs

Post by pranab »

China asks Australia to keep away from its 'internal affairs'

MELBOURNE, APR 11 (PTI)

Strongly reacting to Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's comments on Tibet, China has asked foreign governments to keep away from its "internal affairs" saying they have no right to interfere.

"Tibet is purely an internal affair and none of the foreign countries or other groups has any right to interfere," Chinese Government spokeswoman Jiang Yu said on the Rudd's comment on human right issue in Tibet.

During his ongoing trip to Beijing, Rudd had re-stated Australia's concern about human rights.

Jiang Yu described the talks as "candid and practical" She said Rudd "expressed understanding" of China's position and that Australia was "willing to proceed from a strategic perspective to be a long-term partner" with China, media reports said here.

Rudd had set aside Australia's trade relations issues with China as he raised strong concerns over human rights abuses in Tibet.

"We have disagreements, on human rights generally and on Tibet most recently, but I have always had the view that the best way to prosecute our relationship with China is to be broad-based about it and not pretend problems do not exist when they do," Rudd was qouted saying in the reports here.

During the discussions between the two sides, agreed to boost their ties on climate change to a ministerial level partnership.

The leaders identified several areas for co-operation, including clean coal technology and working together to promote the next international climate change agreement.


link


Hope this will open up Mr.Rudd's eyes to the realities of the nation he loves so much..
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Post by Karan Dixit »

I think Rudd deserves some pat in the back for his latest deeds.

Dear Jiang Yu,

For your information, Tibet is not China's internal affair. Tibet is an independent country. Might does not make it right. Might helps you grab Tibetan real estate but your government is regarded as circle of thugs by people around the globe.

- Karan Dixit
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Post by Gerard »

Australia's biggest wheat farmer goes for growth
Twenty-four years ago Australian Ron Greentree was mowing lawns for a living. This year he will plant wheat on an area the size of Hong Kong, and good rains combined with high prices could bring him a A$100 million windfall.
Using satellite-guided tractors running 24 hours a day and a staff of just 25, plus casuals at planting and harvest, he can produce 250,000 tonnes of wheat in a good year -- and if rain keeps coming, this year will be one of Australia's best.
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Post by Gerard »

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Post by Gerard »

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Post by Rye »

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Post by Karan Dixit »

Australia seems to be heading in the wrong direction. Incest, murder and racism seem to be the main news coming out from Australia.
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Post by Gerard »

Peace protesters deflate NZ spy base dome
Peace activists have attacked and deflated a large inflatable globe housing a satellite dish at a top secret New Zealand spy base in protest at United States military actions
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Post by Avinash R »

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Post by Rye »

Link to article in The Australian
India's disarmament drive

Rory Medcalf | May 12, 2008

TEN years ago yesterday, India jolted the world with nuclear bomb tests and public outpourings of national pride, prompting Pakistan to do the same. Yet this anniversary has passed with little official fanfare in New Delhi.

The country's Congress-led Government has several motives to stay quiet. The 1998 tests were ordered by its Hindu nationalist rivals. (Thanks, Congresswallahs, for exposing internal rifts for your political benefit :evil: ) Moreover, now is a delicate time in India's new atomic gambit: to access global markets in nuclear fuel and technology under a sanction-ending deal with the US. If the contentious deal survives a political deadlock within India, and it may well not, then it will need approval by the 45 countries, including Australia, that set guidelines in nuclear trade. So a jingoistic bomb party is the last thing today's India, economically confident but desperate for energy, needs to show the world.

But there is an even more intriguing reason New Delhi has been low-key about this birthday, and it is one Canberra should welcome.

India has long advocated universal nuclear disarmament, including in a bold plan by Rajiv Gandhi two decades ago. Recent speeches by leading national figures show that India wants to revive that legacy.

It would be joining quite a bandwagon. After the Bush administration's allergy to treaties, a quartet of senior statesmen is making disarmament respectable again in Washington. Henry Kissinger, George Schultz, William Perry and Sam Nunn call for realistic steps to reduce reliance on nuclear weapons and begin the journey to their elimination.

They are driven by fears about the spread of nuclear weapons to more, and potentially dangerous, states; the possibility of nuclear terrorism; and the risk that growing nuclear energy demand could add to weapons proliferation. Their arguments build on a wealth of studies, including Australia's 1996 Canberra Commission report. And they are getting somewhere. Democrat and Republican presidential candidates alike speak of the need for the US's leadership in disarmament, including through restraining its own capabilities.

Momentum is building internationally. Britain is researching how nuclear states might verifiably disarm. France is hinting at reduced roles for its weapons. Many governments admit they need fresh thinking to manage the confusing intersection of arms control and nuclear fuel demand in an era of terrorism, changing power balances, energy insecurity and climate change. Norway has brought together leading global experts to explore next steps, such as unprecedented world co-operation in nuclear energy.

In this gathering debate, India is seeking its place. It is hardly an innocent. It has not signed the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. It defied the world with bomb tests in 1974 and 1998, and continues gradually to build more nuclear weapons and missiles. More than once the world has feared India and Pakistan were drifting close to nuclear war.

Yet New Delhi's interest in reducing nuclear dangers cannot be dismissed as a sham. This is a country that took the nuclear weapons path more in sorrow than in anger. After a war with China in 1962 and Beijing's nuclear test in 1964, India sought and was denied US protection. Remembering the inequities of colonialism, India opposed from the outset the NPT's unequal bargain that legitimised only the arsenals of the five states to have tested before 1967, which is why Labor's insistence on NPT signature as a condition for uranium sales to India is a dead end.

India's alternative to the NPT has been a demand, however quixotic, for time-bound nuclear disarmament by all. India won't give up nuclear weapons unless China and Pakistan do. And China's disarmament requires the US and Russia to lead.

Meanwhile India has applied the non-proliferation principle of not spreading nuclear weapons materials or know-how to others, unlike China with its help to Pakistan, or Pakistan with its infamous A.Q. Khan bazaar. The US-India deal recognises and would reinforce this, bringing many Indian reactors under international safeguards.

India's own weapons aspirations seem limited: a minimal capability to deter other countries from using nuclear weapons, kept on low alert, and based on a doctrine of no first use. And India and Pakistan are making progress in stabilising relations.

India's restrained nuclear posture and its rekindled interest in disarmament offer diplomatic openings for countries seeking new approaches to arms control, including Kevin Rudd's Australia. Their discussions to engage India in the new nuclear disarmament agenda can and should be pursued in tandem with the US-India deal, or, if it falters, whatever new process emerges to bring India into the nuclear energy and non-proliferation mainstream.

The opportunity will be to work with New Delhi to find common ground in reducing nuclear and other security threats. One area for progress could be co-operation to monitor and thwart illicit exports and transit shipments of nuclear, chemical, biological and missile technologies. Another could be talks about nuclear stability in Asia, including to encourage India and China to stick with restrained nuclear postures while urging other nuclear-armed countries to move in that direction. India has even suggested a treaty to ban the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons as a stepping stone to disarmament.

The challenge will lie in bringing India to commit to meeting its full nuclear responsibilities. India needs to say how it plans to keep its word, under the US-India deal, to support a global treaty to ban making fissile material for nuclear weapons, which would eventually cap its arsenal. (Two words: Multilateral and verifiable -- India cannot be party to anything that is not multilateral or is unverifiable.....not unless India is treated on par with NWS in such matters.) India also cannot dodge the bomb testing issue indefinitely. It has to be ready to discuss how and when its testing moratorium should become binding, whether by treaty or as a condition for sustained civil nuclear exports.

Any armed preacher of disarmament faces a credibility gap. And a democracy of India's uniquely bewildering scale will often struggle to be a reliable bargaining partner. But the world has little to lose and potentially much to gain by seeking creative ways to fully engage this key power of the 21st century while putting its reincarnated nuclear idealism to the test.

Rory Medcalf directs the international security program at the Lowy Institute for International Policy. He has served as an Australian diplomat in India and worked on non-proliferation issues.
Regarding the Last paragraph's claim of "credibility gap", why are only "nuclear armed states" susceptible to lack of credibility? what makes the Australians think they have any credibility to talk about Indian disarmament just because they are not nuclear armed?

They have no compunctions selling nuclear material to nuke-proliferating states like China, and preach to India about "holding itself back"...do Australians think such a POV gives them any credibility when it comes to nuclear matters? Yes, there is a credibility gap here, but it is in the australian rhetoric that tries to hide chinese-vassal-state behaviour under the cover of high-minded (but irrelevant) "save the world by collecting rhinoceros semen" kinda-bull$hit logic that ignores chinese hand in global nuclear proliferation.
Last edited by Rye on 14 May 2008 02:13, edited 3 times in total.
Raju

Post by Raju »

As usual Manmohan Singh is busy going about making a mockery of our great nation before the whole world. Little chipmunks like Australia feel they have a right to bait us using some silly redundant Non-Proliferation jargon.
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Post by Rye »

H&D is not an issue, but having a lower standard of acceptable behaviour for totalitarian regimes like the one in China (that have no problems conducting global nuke proliferation to dangerous countries) than for countries like India that have NEVER been involved in ANY KIND of nuclear proliferation...such behaviour does not give the Australians any credibility in their worldview on nukes. The article is pretty accurate for the most part factwise, but the hypocritical preachiness sticks to the throat like bad popcorn.
Last edited by Rye on 13 May 2008 21:50, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by prashanth »

Raju wrote:As usual Manmohan Singh is busy going about making a mockery of our great nation before the whole world. Little chipmunks like Australia feel they have a right to bait us using some silly redundant Non-Proliferation jargon.
Are they doing it voruntaliry or out of extelnar plessule?
Surely the Australians would'nt want to lose the Indian uranium market.
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Post by Rye »

extelnar plessule most likely -- Oz people are usually pragmatic...they are ideologically motivated only by leftist environment-type issues.
Raju

Post by Raju »

Manmohan Singh could well have been a front for those people who wanted this deal done. Business lobby activities seem always very fishy, for they are totally behind this deal, it is also possible that they were promised access for funds, takeover of foreign companies a la Jaguar/LR, Arcelor, greater access to western markets etc and they have fallen hook, line and sinker for it.

also the reason why lot of johnnies are appearing in media claiming how not signing this deal would harm India's image and how it went back on its word etc. A syndicate type group controls access to west, and according to our johnnies we have potentially double-crossed that syndicate by not keeping our part of the bargain.
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Post by Rye »

Err... The Prime Minister of India is a front for the Indian people is more like it. Having been connected to people from the west all his life, MMS carries credbility with people who have no idea (and are afraid of) how India really is, so he is useful for Indian democratic/people interests at this time. Control does not come without access, and Indians will always control India even if there are some glitches in sound leadership along the way, if any.
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Post by svinayak »

Raju wrote:Manmohan Singh could well have been a front for those people who wanted this deal done. Business lobby activities seem always very fishy, for they are totally behind this deal, it is also possible that they were promised access for funds, takeover of foreign companies a la Jaguar/LR, Arcelor, greater access to western markets etc and they have fallen hook, line and sinker for it.

also the reason why lot of johnnies are appearing in media claiming how not signing this deal would harm India's image and how it went back on its word etc. A syndicate type group controls access to west, and according to our johnnies we have potentially double-crossed that syndicate by not keeping our part of the bargain.
I think it should be understood that large corporation actually influence many national policies in the western world. This deal is also similar and Indian lobby is under the infleunce of these business groups. In the modern era business groups are here to stay and will influence the policies whereever they can
Raju

Post by Raju »

the result is also before us.
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Post by svinayak »

Raju wrote:the result is also before us.
That is the reason I tell my family members that if you dont vote properly India will become a banana republic.
Raju

Post by Raju »

Nothing can stop the rise of dharma .. if people want they can participate and get blessings.

future is going to be very different from how some people have planned it out.
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Post by Nayak »

Rudd's aid aim badly off-centre


PIERS AKERMAN

May 26, 2008 12:00am

MANDARIN-SPEAKING Prime Minister Kevin Rudd turned up on Chinese television last week expressing the nation's sorrow at the losses suffered during the recent earthquake.
That gesture was followed by a doubling of Australia's disaster relief contribution from $1 million to $2 million and the addition of a further $1 million from the Western Australian State Government and a pledge of support from WA billionaire Andrew "Twiggy" Forrest, who farewelled the first shipment of iron ore from his Fortescue mine to China last weekend.

The disaster relief contribution comes on top of the Australia Government's official aid to China channelled through AusAID which in 2006-07 was running in excess of $34 million but which with other regional programs and through other departments took the total overseas development aid to in excess of an estimated $46 million.

It is becoming increasingly difficult to reconcile Australia's aid budget to China, even though it is of obvious strategic importance to our economy.

As China is a significant donor to several dubious nations, is Australian aid merely being "churned" or used to plug gaps, enabling the Chinese to distribute their largesse in Africa, the Pacific, North Korea and even to the Burmese junta and reap the political and economic benefits flowing from such generosity?

Weeks before China was struck by the killer earthquakes, neighbouring Burma was devastated by a series of typhoons and, even now, aid from individual nations is waiting on Burma's orders while its despotic generals decide how much they personally will demand as the price of distributing it where it is needed.

China, which has mobilised tens of millions of members of its armed forces to organise its own earthquake relief, could have leant on the Burmese junta to open its borders to humanitarian assistance but it chose not to highlight the junta's inhumanity even as the death toll of 100,000-plus continues to swell as diseases take hold.

Chinese entities continue to supply items and technology useful in weapons of mass destruction, their means of delivery and advanced conventional weapons programs of concern, despite UN Security Council resolutions.

Among the recipients are mineral-rich Zimbabwe, from which an arms-laden freighter had to be turned away after the recent election, and the despotic Sudan, which China turns to for energy supplies.

"What I think is disconcerting is the willingness of China to not only help but to defend rogue regimes," Princeton Lyman, a former US ambassador to both Nigeria and South Africa in the Reagan, George H. W. Bush and Clinton administrations, has told a congressional committee.

"China has in effect inhibited the United Nations from imposing sanctions on Sudan, and in Zimbabwe is helping to bail out a regime that is repressive and is destroying the country."

China, which the Rudd Government prefers to democratic India, supplied nuclear technology to Pakistan, which in turn supplied it to North Korea and Libya and possibly other nations.

While the Rudd Government's first Budget demonstrated its ineffectual approach to domestic politics, Mr Rudd's craven approach to China is starting to make his claim to be a foreign affairs guru look just as ridiculous.

Placing his personal affinity with China before Australia's long-term relationships with Japan and India has been a disaster. While he is hoping to make some amends with a belated visit to Tokyo, the Indians remain sceptical.

And with good reason. China is still supplying conventional weapons to Iran at a time when Iran is supplying and funding groups in Iraq, to Hezbollah in Lebanon and to the Taliban in Afghanistan where they are being used against Australian forces and our allies.

According to testimony given during a US congressional hearing, China has 39,000 people devoted to policing the internet so it can arrest people who use the words "Taiwan" and "democracy" in the same email. It has 500,000 people devoted to ensuring public order so there are no demonstrations by the Falun Gong. The earthquake toll is presently estimated at 50,000 and, according to the US Defense Department, China is spending more than $US90 billion annually to expand its influence.

While the US Government is focusing on the political alliances China has been making with nations infamous for their continued human rights violations, rampant corruption and state-sponsored terrhorism, the Rudd administration is building even closer bridges with the totalitarian regime.

Last September, Mr Rudd accepted a personal invitation from Chinese President Hu Jintao, who invited the Labor leader and his family to Beijing for the 2008 Olympics.

Mr Rudd said he would be pleased to take up Mr Hu's invitation, adding: "As a further indication of some kindness towards myself, he invited myself and my family to attend the Olympics in Beijing next year, which I would be very keen to do."

Since then, the world has recoiled as the Chinese have crushed rebellious Tibetans and have watched in horror as the Chinese leadership failed to make any meaningful effort to get Burma's junta to permit assistance to reach their suffering countrymen.

Mr Rudd's invitation from the Chinese to the Beijing Olympics is looking more and more toxic.

After all, he might wind up sharing a box with leaders of China's other good friends, Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe or North Korea's Kim Jong-Il.

Mr Rudd ducked the Olympic "torture" relay when it passed through Canberra. As a former low-level diplomat, it should be easy for him to find a form of weasel words that will enable him to miss Beijing.

He must, however, be asked why Australia needs to send aid to China, which has placed nuclear weapons in the hands of some of the world's greatest psychopaths.
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Post by Nayak »


Australia needs to stop focusing on China and look to all of Asia

S.P. Seth, Sydney

If Prime Minister Kevin Rudd was banking on his specialist understanding of China as a Mandarin speaker to forge a new relationship with Beijing, it has obviously not worked so far.

His government initially sought to ingratiate with Beijing by snubbing Japan and India. Tokyo was not amused when it was left out of Rudd's recent major foreign trip to the United States, Europe and China.

The Rudd government also dumped the quadrilateral security dialogue to include the United States, Japan, India and Australia. Even worse, this was done at a joint press conference with the visiting Chinese foreign minister.

As Beijing was dead set against this viewing it as part of a containment policy, this decision seemed to give China a role in the formulation of Australia's foreign policy, at least when it concerned China. And not surprisingly, it wasn't regarded well by other dialogue partners.

India was also left out of the loop on the question of uranium supplies. The Howard government was favorably disposed on this issue as part of an emerging U.S.-India strategic nexus.

Beijing couldn't have asked for more from the new Australian government, confirming the widely held view that Kevin Rudd was biased towards China.

Apparently, Rudd believed that having proved his China credentials early on, he would now have some friendly license to express his honest views on China's human rights problem during the Tibetan unrest. And he did it quite frankly during his China visit, advising Beijing to hold dialogue with the Dalai Lama and his representatives on the question.

This was all happening in the midst of the Olympic torch relay when protests were staged in London, Paris and elsewhere against China's repression in Tibet. The protesters were also targeting the Chinese paramilitary security presence surrounding the torch.

At the time Prime Minister Rudd declared that the security of the Olympic torch relay would be handled only by the Australian police during its passing through Canberra. This apparently added to Beijing's displeasure, and it showed this by seeking to ignore Rudd's directive, thus creating a murky situation.

In other words, Prime Minister Rudd's special relationship with China looked like unraveling even before it got going.

At another level, Beijing was hoping it might get a sympathetic treatment from the new Rudd government on the pricing of resource materials (like iron ore) China is importing from Australia. In the last few years, prices of resource materials have soared because of growing demand, much of it from China.

One way of putting some control over the price is for China to have an equity stake in Australian corporations engaged in mining and exporting these materials. Beijing is now aggressively pushing to acquire such stake and control. But it is meeting some resistance, which it regards as discriminatory.

Writing in The Australian, Jennifer Hewett, its national affairs correspondent, has commented that, "The Rudd government is becoming extremely concerned about the prospect of ever-increasing Chinese investment in Australian resources companies."

It can't just be a sheer coincidence that an Australian operated gold mining company in China has, at about the same time, come under severe criticism on Chinese television and other media outlets for acquiring the company for almost nothing and for causing environmental degradation and other vile practices.

John Garnaut, Sydney Morning Herald's Beijing correspondent, reported in his paper on May 12 that, "The 30-minute tirade, which advocated even tougher restrictions on foreign investment in Chinese mines, was broadcast nationally twice last week and the transcript reprinted on more than 500 Chinese internet news and blog sites."

As it happens, there is a convergence of sorts between China's resentment over Prime Minister Rudd's criticism over Tibet, and the economics and politics of Australia's mining, investment and export of resource materials.

As columnist Ian Verrender has put it in the Sydney Morning Herald, "Soon after delivering his message in Mandarin to Beijing (during Rudd's China visit] about human rights concerns [in Tibet), he was confronted with accusations that Australia treated Chinese investment differently than money from other nations."

With its economic success and political power, China is in the midst of a national upsurge. It believes that the timing of the Tibetan unrest, to coincide with the Olympic torch relay, is a conspiracy against its coming of age as a great/super power, with the August Olympics as a spectacular backdrop.

And Australia's joining of the criticism of its human rights in Tibet has dented Rudd's credentials as China's friend.

In its courting of Beijing, the Rudd government sought to substitute China for the whole of Asia. Among the three pillars of Australia's foreign policy under his government (as spelled out in a signed article not long before Rudd became Prime Minister), while the first two would focus on "our alliance with the United States [and], our membership of the United Nations", the third pillar would comprise "a policy of comprehensive engagement with the Asia-Pacific region."

But so far, the engagement with Asia-Pacific would seem to suggest mainly China. Japan and India aside, having been given short shrift, Southeast Asia seems to have escaped notice of the Rudd government.

Critiquing then Prime Minister John Howard's Asia policy in his signed article, Rudd wrote, "In our own region, Australia has increasingly the look and feel of an outsider...(because) Mr Howard has emphasized Australia's differences from, rather than commonalities with, the region."

And Rudd promised that under his Labor Party government, Australia "will revert to a long tradition of engagement with the region..." with a view to "find Australia's security in Asia, not from it..."

With such scant notice taken so far of Southeast Asia, it is not surprising that Indonesia, the largest ASEAN country, has felt left out. Even more so because Indonesia has been routinely featured as Australia's important, if not the most important, neighbor.

The problem, though, is that even when Indonesia is recognized as Australia's important neighbor, Canberra doesn't really know how to give it a concrete shape in bilateral relations, other than the security aspect of it in some form or the other. And since the relationship has always lacked depth, it tends to languish. At the moment, though, it is in slumber.

The Rudd government was expected to energize the entire gamut of Australia's foreign relations with ASEAN countries. But the early signs do not look promising.

With his anticipated close relationship with Beijing, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd was hoping to become an interlocutor between China and the West. By virtue of that Australia would also gain a new respect in Asia, being China's buddy.

But it doesn't seem to be working like that. The Rudd government may need to rework its Asia policy by recognizing its different components and dealing with them in their own right rather than expecting them to fit in as part of Canberra's grand plan.

It is early days yet with the Rudd government having been in power for only some months. It might yet surprise us with a more broad-based Asia policy as it gets going.

The writer is a freelance writer based in Sydney and can be reached at SushilPSeth@aol.com
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