APSNet 25 August 2008

1. UN Report says Timor at Human Rights Crossroads
2. Rudd Remains Firm on E Timor Guest Workers
3. Guest Worker Policy to Spread to East Timor
4. Menace of the Growing Red Fleet
5. Debating China’s Future
6. Can I Say, Kevin, it’s not your Best Shot
7. Asia Could See Growing WMD Threat, Expert Warns
8. Our Turn to be Heard on Arms Spending

1. UN Report says Timor at Human Rights Crossroads, Stephanie March with Mark Green and Louis Gentile, ABC, 2008-08-21 [transcript]

East Timor is at a human rights crossroads, says a new report by the United Nations. The UN says in the last six months there’s been a notable increase in complaints of human rights abuses against East Timor’s national police.

• UN Rejects Timor Attack ‘Failure’, Lucy Williamson, BBC, 2008-08-21
• Security Council, in Presidential Statement, Reaffirms Need for Sustained International Presence in Timor-Leste, as Situation there Still Fragile, News and Media Division, Security Council, UN, 2008-08-19

2. Rudd Remains Firm on E Timor Guest Workers, Emma Rodgers, ABC, 2008-08-25

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has defended excluding East Timor from the proposed guest worker program, but says he looks forward to discussions on the issue with the country’s Prime Minister Xanana Gusmao. Mr Rudd says, “East Timor is also the recipient of other development assistance and cooperation from Australia.”

3. Guest Worker Policy to Spread to East Timor, Ben Doherty and Sarah Smiles, Age, 2008-08-22

A new guest worker scheme, this one to bring East Timorese workers to the labour-starved Kimberley region of Western Australia, appears likely to be announced soon. It appears likely that East Timorese workers would be restricted to the Kimberley, and to working in horticulture. WA has signed an agreement with East Timor, but it needs Federal Government approval.

4. Menace of the Growing Red Fleet, Cameron Stewart, Australian, 2008-08-23

The slow, steady rise of China as a maritime power is increasingly concentrating the minds of defence planners in Washington and Canberra as they try to gauge its significance and weigh its implications for the region. The latest and most stunning example of China’s expanding naval ambitions in the Pacific is the recent confirmation of a new underground nuclear submarine base near Sanya, on Hainan Island off China’s southern coast.

• China’s Navy 2007, Office of Naval Intelligence, U.S. Navy [2.37 MB. PDF]

5. Debating China’s Future, China Security, Part 1: Vol. 4 No.2 Spring 2008 [483KB, PDF]

To mark this important chapter in China’s journey, we have invited many of the leading thinkers on the subject, from inside and outside its borders, to reflect on China’s accomplishments and contemplate its future – in fewer than 500 words.

• Debating China’s Future, China Security, Part 2: Vol. 4 No.3 Summer 2008 [2.03MB, PDF]

6. Can I Say, Kevin, it’s not your Best Shot, Brian Toohey, AFR*, 2008-08-23

The forthcoming defence white paper is expected to recommend that Australia acquire an expanded ability to participate in the anti-ballistic missile (ABM) screen being deployed by the US around China and Russia. Australia is already purchasing three air-warfare destroyers capable of forming part of the US seaborne ABM system that China sees as aimed at it.
* Subscription required.

• Australia’s Nuclear Dilemma: Dependence, Deterrence or Denial? Raoul E. Heinrichs, Security Challenges*, Volume 4, Number 1, 2008, pp. 55-67
  * Subscription required.

7. Asia Could See Growing WMD Threat, Expert Warns, NTI, 2008-08-21

An Australian defense analyst has warned that China’s growing influence could spark an arms race in Asia involving weapons of mass destruction. “When our American friends tell us it’s the Middle East which is the most likely area of proliferation and nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, [it’s] not,’ Paul Dibb, a professor at ANU said, ‘It’s Asia that has the most potent latent capabilities to develop nuclear, chemical and biological weapons.”

8. Our Turn to be Heard on Arms Spending, Jake Lynch, Brisbane Times, 2008-08-23

Australia’s Defence Minister, Joel Fitzgibbon, told the National Press Club that we now face “an increasingly uncertain security environment”. Really? The Human Security Project at Simon Fraser University in Canada finds the world becoming, on one important measure, a safer place. So please, let’s not waste money on war-fighting kit we don’t want and don’t need, whether manufactured by Thales or anyone else. Let’s concentrate, instead, on addressing the real causes of conflict, and help to bring peace with justice to our own region.

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Richard Tanter,
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