• North Korea has 'created an army division in charge of newly developed intermediate-range missiles capable of striking U.S. forces in Japan and Guam'.
• Hungry Beast examines a Defence Department payroll 'anomaly' for deployed soldiers. Fixing it is reportedly running into political problems.
• Updating our previous links on extremists in Aceh, Indonesian police have confirmed the link between their Jakarta raid and counter-terrorism operations in Aceh.
• Business Spectator’s Robert Gottliebsen has responded to Sam’s post on the Joint Strike Fighter. Sam will have more on this issue next week.

Australia's travel advisories always raise a few questions. They have been a particular irritant in the relationship with Indonesia, but the impact they have is curious.

The first line of the current travel advice to Indonesia reads:

We advise you to reconsider your need to travel to Indonesia, including Bali, at this time due to the very high threat of terrorist attack.

And what impact does that have on travel to Indonesia?  

read more

Whatever diplomatic niceties accompany the visit to Australia this week of Indonesia's president, both sides will be keenly aware the bilateral relationship is not as strong as it should be. Lowy Polling shows Australians don't have particularly warm feelings towards Indonesia, and Indonesians feel the same way about Australia.

Economically, it's as if Indonesia is on the other side of the globe — we do almost twice as much trade with New Zealand, which has less than 2% of the population and an economy about one-fifth the size of Indonesia's.

Both sides might point out that at least government-level linkages are in a good state. To an extent this is true — both governments do cooperate on a wide front and have regular exchanges — but just a few examples reveal it's not all that peachy. This is the third sentence from DFAT's Indonesia country brief:

Australia and Indonesia cooperate in practical ways on a wide range of international issues, including counter-terrorism, illegal fishing, people smuggling, avian influenza, climate change and interfaith dialogue.  

These may be valuable areas of cooperation, but they are also quite negative areas to highlight. Each of them focuses on threats to Australia (as well as Indonesia).

Another example is a speech by Foreign Minister Stephen Smith billed as 'Australia's vision for the future of the Australia-Indonesia partnership'. The headings that followed 'The current bilateral relationship' were: 'security cooperation', 'regional disaster response' and 'Indonesia's development challenges'. And this was delivered to an Indonesian audience.  

Steven Colbert called it early. The Cold War is back — at least at the Winter Olympics in Canada. Now the New York Times is reporting:

President Dmitri A. Medvedev of Russia, angered over his country’s disappointing performance at the Winter Games, began calling for athletic officials’ heads.

“Those who are responsible for training for the Olympics must take responsibility,” Mr. Medaled, who canceled his scheduled trip to the closing ceremonies, said in Moscow on Monday. “They must have the courage to submit their resignation,” he said. “And if they do not have this resolve, we will help them.”

On Monday Senator Wong tabled some fascinating answers to a series of questions on notice from Senator Ludlam concerning Australia's approach to war crimes (see p.110 of this Senate Hansard, made available online this morning). Just incidentally, the questions were asked on 30 September 2009 — so at 146 days for a reply that's slightly over the 30-day rule.

A number of Senator Ludlam's questions are dodged, but there are some interesting insights into the gaps in Australia's war crimes policy. The most interesting replies concerned:

• Gaps in our war crimes legislation: the answer to question four confirms the obvious enough fact that the AFP only investigates 'potential war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide where there is jurisdiction' but goes on to note there were serious gaps in Australia's jurisdiction before comprehensive legislation was implemented in 2002. For war crimes committed in non-international armed conflicts before this date — like the devastating Rwandan genocide — the only legislation referred to in the response is the Crimes (Torture) Act which criminalises torture committed after February 1989 and the Crimes (Hostages) Act which criminalises hostage-taking after June 1990.

Last week Rory and I wrote a piece in The Australian arguing for a more transparent look at attacks on Indian students. As research for that article we asked (on 8 February) the Victorian Police and the Premier's Office for some stats. The police only got back to me on Tuesday the 23rd, but I thought I'd share their replies to our questions. Draw your own conclusions about how on-top of this issue they are, nine months after the attacks hit the headlines.

Q1: What Victorian government/police statistics have been made publicly available regarding the attacks on Indians and/or Indian Australians?

A: Victoria Police records details on victims based on racial appearance and not ethnicity. Racial appearance is based on the subjective assessment of attending police and is recorded primarily for operational and intel purposes only. Racial appearance is one limited indicator of ethnicity based on appearance only and does not necessarily mean that the person(s) attributed to a particular ethnic group are in fact of that origin.

Information pertaining to Racial Appearance is available via the Annual Crime Publication where they are categorised under the broad categories of Aboriginal, Asian, Caucasian, Other and Unspecified.

Any analysis done pertaining to the ethnicity of a victim is for intelligence purposes and is not available to the public. 

One of the strangest lines to have been uttered regarding the attacks on Indian students is this one from Victorian Police Commissioner Simon Overland:

'... If you look at the data they are safer here than they are in India'.

What is bizarre about it is how he thought this kind of stat would help address the concerns of Indians.

Just think of the same scenario involving Australians. If there appeared to be a pattern of attacks specifically targeting Australians in some ultra-safe Scandinavian country, would inflamed national opinion be ameliorated with the comforting news we are still safer studying in Scandinavia than Melbourne? Would images of the second, third, or fourth twenty-something Australian student stabbed or in a coffin be passively accepted as just bad luck? Would we be grateful that our compatriots are still statistically safer in Stockholm? I suspect not.

What the Police Commissioner seems to have overlooked is that perception matters, deeply.

There has been a great deal of inconsistency from all sides on this issue and that has resulted in heavy damage to Australia's image in India. As Rory and I argue in today's Australian, until there is an open and transparent assessment of the available data by an independent committee, that includes a representative of the Indian Government, doubts about Australian racial tolerance and perceptions of a cover-up will continue to linger on both sides.

The Asia New Zealand Foundation has just released its annual Perceptions of Asia survey. One of the questions in the poll — on feelings towards people from other countries —  was very close to one included in the Lowy Institute Poll (which asks about feelings towards countries rather than people).

In both polls people were asked to rate their feelings on a 0 to 100 scale. The questions are not perfectly comparable but they do suggest a striking agreement across the Tasman about which countries/people we like better. In both polls Japan topped the list (of Asian states) followed by Thailand and India. In both Australia and New Zealand China and South Korean tied for next place followed by Indonesia.

Another interesting parallel was in a question asking New Zealanders to use a 1 to 5 scale to rate how important various regions were. Australia topped the ranking for New Zealanders (60% gave it a 5  meaning 'very important'), but next was Asia with 40%, while just 25% rated North America as very important.

The 2009 Lowy Institute Poll suggested Australians also saw Asia as very important compared with North America (at least in economic terms). Of three economies, 63% said China's was the most important to Australia at the moment, compared with just 27% for the US. 72% also said China will be more powerful after the global economic crisis than before and 40% that India will be more powerful, while a third said the US will be less powerful.

I've been looking at Australia-Fiji relations recently. One of the things that's struck me is just how difficult it is to balance Australian interests in Fiji with our response to the regime. One example of this tension is the system of travel sanctions Australia has imposed against the interim regime as well as their family members.

According to the DFAT website, sanctions apply to family members of high profile coup supporters, ranking Republic of Fiji Military Forces (RFMF) officers (warrant officer rank and above) and interim government ministers.

While some family members might act as de factor arms of the regime when abroad (and help them circumvent the effects of the sanctions) punishing the children of regime leaders purely on the basis of blood still sits uncomfortably with Australian values and democratic principles. 

That's not to say Australia should scrap its travel sanctions against Fiji, just that it is hard to make even targeted sanctions fit exactly with the principles you are trying to uphold.

Photo by Flickr user superciliousness, used under a Creative Commons license.

Last week a fire alarm went off at the Lowy Institute. The evacuation (for what turned out to be a false alarm) was fairly routine, but it could have been so much more entertaining (it's my favourite scene from the American version of The Office).

It's been hard to get any concrete information about China's aid program to Fiji since the military rulers took over in December 2006. The interim Government cooperated on the first paper I wrote on this, but apparently regretted doing so. To try and find out a little more, I convinced an amiable and bemused taxi driver from Suva to take me on a tour of a newly completed Chinese aid project — a new Friendship Bridge (pictured).

The bridge appears to be a pretty useful contribution and the nearby residents must be grateful for the 30 minutes it cuts off a commute to the other side of the river.

But what was more remarkable about the Chinese aid presence in Fiji was its modesty. For all the hype, including promises from the Chinese of a US$150 million soft loan, things have been pretty quiet. There is a large hydro-electric project going ahead, but so far the promised squatter resettlement project has failed to commence — apparently over a failure to reach agreement on quality issues and use of local labour (which the Chinese are resisting).

The New York Times brings you an interesting snapshot of six state of the union addresses from around the world.

My favourites were the Dutch Queen...

The lack of integration of certain groups in society, widespread disrespectful and offensive behavior in public places and criminal behavior by groups of young people are stubborn problems that cause a great deal of annoyance. The government is therefore not only taking consistent action against offenders but also tackling the causes of unacceptable behavior.

...and Russian President:

I note that in August this year, Russia registered its natural population increase for the first time in the last 15 years. This growth is still only small — just 1,000 people — but still, it is an increase nonetheless. This result was achieved above all thanks to the National Project on Health and the new demographic policy we have been implementing....

In November I looked at China's engagement in East Timor, including its brand new Embassy, nearing completion. In Fiji, there are also signs of China's largesse and increased engagement. On a Sunday afternoon in stiflingly hot Suva all was quiet except for the Chinese labourers busy completing the new Chinese Embassy compound due to open later this year:

I can't believe it. Just a few weeks ago I was predicting the end of the fraught Arab-Persian diplomatic battle over the naming of the Gulf. The sleuthing Iraqi Foreign Minister seemed to have finally settled the issue with the discovery in some archive or other that it was actually called the Gulf of Basra. 

So much for predictions of an end to this nagging issue. While I was away last week the BBC reported a dramatic development in the dispute, with the cancellation of the Islamic Solidarity Games that were due to be held in Iran in April. As the BBC reported it:

The games federation in Saudi Arabia said the Iranian organisers had failed to address its concerns, particularly about the planned logo and medals.

These bear the words "Persian Gulf"....The Islamic Solidarity Sports Federation (ISSF) in Riyadh said, after an emergency board meeting, Iran's local organising committee "unilaterally took some decisions without asking the federation by writing some slogans on the medals and pamphlets of the games".  

The Interpreter will vigilantly follow this story and bring you any developments.

Photo by Flickr user Pete Ruscitti, used under a Creative Commons license.

I was in Fiji last week. One of the meetings I had was with the Foreign Minister Inoke Kubuabola. Afterwards he agreed to an interview for The Interpreter by email. My questions and his responses are below (NB our exchange was prior to the announcement of Fiji's proposed diplomatic appointment to New Zealand): 

What do you see as the key to getting Australia-Fiji relations back on track? What do both Australia and Fiji have to do to make this happen?

The meeting between the New Zealand Foreign Minister, Murray McCully and myself at Nadi on January 8 and 9, was classified and I am therefore not in a position to comment on any substantive matter discussed. What I can say however is that the meeting was the first at Foreign Minister level between our two countries and that the atmosphere was cordial. The objective of the meeting was to improve bilateral relations between our two countries.

The New Zealand Foreign Minister and I spoke on issues of interest to our two countries. The dialogue was constructive. A positive development of the meeting was that we agreed to restore a Fiji Counsellor in Wellington and a New Zealand Counsellor in Suva as a first step towards the re-establishment of full High Commissions in our capitals. Both parties agreed to further meetings in the future.

My analysis of the meeting was that it laid the foundation for improving relations between our two South Pacific nations which have had a prior history of close and friendly relations. Geography, history, economic relations and close ties between our peoples dictate a return to the status quo ante.

Was progress made with re-engaging the EU after the Prime Minister’s recent visit? I noticed the Prime Minister made mention of possibly re-introducing parts of the constitution in a press release during the visit. What are the government’s plans in this regard? read more

With renewed tensions over Japanese whaling, this week we bring you a different perspective (and a quick primer on New Zealand English):

Last year the UK moved to update its war crimes legislation to make it less likely that accused individuals could escape justice. France has just announced its own reforms in this area, with the Government to:

...set up a new panel to try cases of genocide and war crimes committed in France or abroad. The new court would speed up the way genocide cases are tried where the suspect is on French territory but the process involves several jurisdictions. The unit is to include linguists and specialists with historical knowledge.

The Australian Government is still to move on its election promise to close legislative loopholes in this area, but developments in both of these countries, as well as others like Canada, the US and The Netherlands, should help spark a few ideas.

Middle sized powers like Australia often have to accept their limited spheres of influence. Australia's dominion spreads across the Pacific, where its power and influence are felt so intensely that its labels and appellations have ranged from 'bully' to 'Deputy Sheriff'. But over the break there was a striking example of this all-controlling might, involving one of Australia's most dependent satellites.

Tiny Nauru — population 9,771 people — which receives the vast majority of its GDP from Australian ODA, showed just how constrained it felt by Canberra's muscular reach. 

In an unorthodox foreign policy move, it decided to take the bold step of joining Venezuela and Nicaragua in recognising Russian-backed Abkhazia and South Ossetia. The cost to Russia was a little steep — $US50 million, or just over $US5,000 per Nauruan — although the Nauruan Finance Minister later insisted the gesture was based purely on principle and not because of promises of aid.

The NSW Supreme Court on Friday handed down a striking judgment in the case of Daniel Snedden. In his defamation case against Nationwide News (publisher of The Australian) for an article the newspaper published entitled 'Serbian death squad commander alive and well and teaching golf in Perth', the court found in favour of Nationwide News and ordered Mr Snedden to pay costs.

The judgement reads like a de facto war crimes trial. The plaintiff, Mr Snedden (who strenuously denies the allegations against him), argued the article in The Australian implied:

Is it a sign of the improving situation in Iraq that the Iraqi Foreign Minister has found the time to do some serious historical research into the true name of the Gulf?

In what will likely be seen as a seminal contribution to historiography — and, no doubt, to regional peace building too — the Foreign Minister has finally put an end to the controversy surrounding the naming of that well-loved body of water, known variously as the (Arabian) Gulf and the Persian Gulf.

We have discussed Iranian sensitivities on this issue before, but it turns out all sides were wasting their time in pointless argument: the real name, the Iraqi Foreign Minister has discovered, is the Gulf of Basra.

Photo by Flickr user Alireza Teimoury, used under a Creative Commons license.

Following the launch of the report of the International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament (discussed by Rory here) the Lowy Institute hosted a panel discussion to assess its key findings.

I spoke with panelist and Lowy Institute Deputy Director Martine Letts afterwards about the report, what makes it different from previous such efforts and whether it's unrealistically radical or too tame?  

The Lowy Institute today released its first public opinion poll conducted in China. There's a lot in there, but here are some of the findings I found most interesting:

• In the context of the upcoming Copenhagen climate change negotiations and China's lukewarm pledge on emissions intensity reductions, it was striking that of nine possible threats to China’s security, 'environmental issues like climate change' and 'water and food shortages' topped the list ahead of more traditional threats like the US trying to restrain China's growing influence or the possibility of Japan acquiring nuclear weapons.
• 50% of the Chinese people said the US posed a threat to China's security, making it the most threatening of five countries. Forty-five per cent said Japan posed a threat, but only a third (34%) saw India as a threat and just 21% nominated Russia.

The Lowy Institute will tomorrow release its first opinion poll conducted in China, but today we're releasing two findings on Chinese attitudes towards foreign investment and education abroad.

The poll uses a methodology developed by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs — a world leader in polling — and produced some intriguing results.

Here in Australia, investment by Chinese state-owned firms has sparked a decent amount of controversy, including over the arrest of Rio Tinto executive Stern Hu after a Chinese state-owned firm failed to buy a stake in the mining giant. And our 2008 Lowy Poll (p. 6) showed just how resistant Australians are to Chinese-state-owned investment in major Australian companies.

It turns out the Chinese aren't that keen either when the tables are turned. 

Asked how they would feel if companies controlled by five different governments tried to buy controlling stakes in major Chinese firms, only investment from the Singaporean Government secured majority support from the Chinese public. The Chinese people were divided over investment coming from the Australian and Canadian Governments, while large majorities were against sovereign investment coming from the US and Japan:

On education, Australia did better.

Reader Paul Cotton writes in with this reply to my post on China's engagement with East Timor.

How calmly events such as this are taken these days.

I well recall in 1976 a new Soviet Ambassador (resident in Wellington) presented his credentials to the King of Tonga. The Tonga Chronicle (the weekly Nuku’alofa paper) soon reported that the Ambassador had expressed a desire to set up a base for the Soviet fishing fleet in the Kingdom complete with refuelling and repair facilities. His Majesty, who would have written the article, was apparently “considering the request”.

The paper reached Wellington, London and Washington about the same time as it reached me in Apia from where I was cross accredited to the Kingdom. The possibility of a Soviet base in the South Pacific stirred every dovecote and the decision was taken that the King must be “spoken to” right away if not sooner.

Politicians go to such lengths to get the perfect political backdrop for interviews. But has Sarah Palin set a new standard with this tranquil turkey slaughter scene?

President Barack Obama is expected to make an announcement on a troop surge in Afghanistan on Tuesday, while the New York Times is reporting that allies are being hit up for an extra 10,000 soldiers. 

I asked the Lowy Institute's Andrew Shearer — who has been involved in managing Australian coalition troop contributions both at the Australian Embassy in Washington and in Canberra — about the announcements. You can listen to his response in the audio track below. 

• Obama is heading to Copenhagen with promises of emissions cuts of 17% off 2005 levels by 2020 — but he'll miss the final negotiations where any deals will be struck.
• Happy Thanksgiving to our American readers. FP gives you five things to be thankful for.
• US troop announcement for Afghanistan expected Tuesday with reports 10,000 extra troops will be requested from allies.  
• The Washington Post closes three more bureaus.
• Politico looks into exactly how unprecedented the Obama presidency is.
• The NYT Magazine profiles VP Joe Biden.

It's intriguing how acronyms as ridiculous as CPRS have entered into the vernacular as climate change discussions have taken off. No doubt we can expect more impenetrable jargon as the Copenhagen talks get underway, but to soften the blow Fergus Green and Greg Picker yesterday launched a Lowy Analysis offering something of a survival guide to the talks.

They had a chat to me after the launch about the kind of deal we can expect from Copenhagen, the implications for Australia of going to the summit with an emissions reduction scheme signed off at home and what might explain signs of emerging skepticism from the public even as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concludes 'there is no longer any doubt that the earth's climate is warming'.   

• The Economist's weekly cartoon has a suggestion for the 2040 Climate Change Summit: a wave-lapped Mount Everest.
• United Russia held a two-day pow-wow with the Chinese Communist Party in October 'to glean information and know-how from Beijing’s authoritarian political and economic model' but, asks the Moscow Times, can the Chinese model really be replicated in Russia?
• The Heritage Foundation sets out a series of key Asian indicators: there are lots of interesting comparisons — I like the the last one on support for the US in the UN.
• Obama was labelled the 'pussyfooting' president for failing to stand up for basic human rights during his visit to China, but there's no need for side-stepping with the universally despised Mugabe it would seem. 
• Burkha Barbie.  

The 2009 Lowy Institute Poll released last month found 76% of Australians thought climate change was a problem, but that it was slipping as a goal people wanted the government to tackle and as a perceived threat. A new poll reported in the Washington Post suggests a similar trend in the United States, with the percentage of Americans who believe global warming is happening dipping from 80% to 72% over a year. The poll also found:

• '55 percent of respondents believe the United States should curb its carbon output even if major developing nations such as China and India do less.'
• 'A majority of respondents still support legislation to cap emissions and trade pollution allowances, by a margin of 53 to 42 percent.'  

 Photo by Flickr user targophoto.com, used under a Creative Commons license.