APSNet for 20070215
Austral Peace and Security Network (APSNet)
Twice weekly report from the Nautilus Institute at RMIT, Australia.
Thursday 15 February 2007
- US Gets Military Base in Western Australia
- Key Points of N. Korea Disarmament Deal
- Indonesia Needs US Assistance to Secure Malacca Straits
- East Timor: Ramos Horta Calls for More UN Help
- ADF at Fault in Theft Probe: Keelty
- Staticide in Iraq
- Self-Determination in Oceania: New Roles for US, Japanese and Asian Power?
- Australia and Turkey Sign Agreement on Counter-Terrorism
Austral Policy Forum 07-04A – Reflections on Solidarity with East Timor – Pat Walsh
-
US Gets Military Base in Western Australia, Brendan Nicholson, Age, 2007-02-15
Australia’s defence alliance with the US is to be further entrenched with the building of a new US military communications base at Geraldton in Western Australia. The base will provide a crucial link for a new network of military satellites that will help America’s ability to fight wars in the Middle East and Asia.
-
Australian Defence Satellite Communications Station, (Question No. 2326), Questions in Writing, House of Representatives, Parliament of Australia, 2005-11-05
-
Defence Signals Directorate, Department of Defence, Intelligence and Security
-
Coordinates of the Australian Defence Satellite Communications Station, Kojarena, Geraldton, Western Australia, 28° 44′ S, 114° 50′ E [Google Earth]*
* Google Earth (free download) required.
-
-
Key Points of N. Korea Disarmament Deal, AP, Washington Post, 2007-02-13
Points include: the North must provide a list of its nuclear programs and disable existing nuclear facilities; USA and Japan begin bilateral talks with the DPRK to normalize relations; the North gets aid worth 950,000 tons of heavy fuel oil. Five working groups are created – denuclearization, U.S.-DPRK relations, Japan-DPRK relations, economic cooperation, and on a peace and security mechanism in NE Asia.
-
Joint Statement: Six-Party Talks on N. Korea Disarmament, Washington Post, 2007-02-13
-
Options For DPRK Energy Sector Engagement, Peter Hayes, Nautilus Institute, June 2006 [PPT]
-
North Korea: Agreement Sparks Debate, Sen Lam with Richard Tanter, ABC, 2007-02-15
-
North Korea Nuclear Talks Announce ‘Landmark’ Deal, Sen Lam with Wu Dawei, Christopher Hill, and Shinzo Abe, ABC, 2007-02-14
-
Australia: North Korea Encouraged with Sweeteners, Graeme Dobell with Alexander Downer, ABC, 2007-02-15 [transcript]
-
-
Indonesia Needs US Assistance to Secure Malacca Straits, Dian Yuliastuti and Sutarto, TempoInteractive, 2007-02-14
Defense Minister Juwono Sudarsono has said that Indonesia needs US assistance to secure the waters around the Malacca Straits and seas of Indonesian islands as well. The assistance will take the form of facilities and infrastructure. “This will be better than a delegation of power,” said Juwono prior to meeting with General Peter Pace, Chief of Staff of Joint US Military Force.
-
Ramos Horta Calls for More UN Help, Lindsay Murdoch, Age, 2007-02-14
East Timor’s Prime Minister Jose Ramos Horta has urged the UN to approve the sending of additional police from Portugal to join 1313 international police in the country.
-
Timor-Leste, UN Security Council Report, February 2007
-
-
ADF at Fault in Theft Probe: Keelty, Natalie O’Brien, Australian, 2007-02-15
Australian Federal Police Commissioner Mick Keelty has blamed the Defence Department’s poor procedures for its failure to track down stolen military weapons and prosecute the thieves. Mr Keelty told a Senate committee that inadequate military policing and record-keeping had frustrated police inquiries.
-
Staticide in Iraq, Toby Dodge, le Monde Diplomatique, February 2007
A violent civil war now dominates Iraq. If the country is to be stabilised, a central government with a monopoly on coercion must be rebuilt with administrative capacity to give it legitimacy. The Iraqi state, its ministries, civil servants, police force and army, ceased to exist in any meaningful way in the aftermath of regime change. It is the inability of the US to reconstruct them that lies at the heart of the problem.
-
Self-Determination in Oceania: New Roles for US, Japanese and Asian Power? Terence Wesley-Smith, Japan Focus, 2007-02-12
The idea of somehow engineering the wholesale transformation of the central values and practices of Oceanic societies to fit the mold of western-style administration is deeply troubling-especially if this is essentially to further the security interests of external powers. Such ‘development’ efforts may even have helped create the unstable conditions we now confront in places like Solomon Islands or PNG.
-
Australia and Turkey Sign Agreement on Counter-Terrorism, Media Release, Minister for Foreign affairs, 2007-02-12
The MOU provides a framework for cooperation between Australian and Turkish agencies in areas such as law enforcement and legal issues, anti-terrorist financing, border and transport security, defence, intelligence and countering chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear terrorism.
Austral Policy Forum 07-04A: Reflections on Solidarity with East Timor – Pat Walsh
Pat Walsh, Adviser on Transitional Justice to President Xanana Gusmao of Timor Leste, emphasizes “the critical contribution made to the eventual achievement of Timor’s independence by international civil society” and its continuing importance. Closely associated with the Timor Leste Truth and Reconciliation Commission (CAVR), Walsh notes the close documentation in the Commission’s report of “global civil society’s ‘remarkable gift of solidarity’ to Timor-Leste”. Finally, Walsh’s discussion of many decades of solidarity with East Timor concludes with a personal evaluation of the country after the crisis of mid-2006: “the Timor project has not failed. The situation is precarious and fragile and formidable challenges, especially in delivering justice and economic opportunity, are still ahead, but Timor is not a failed state. Constitutional processes have been followed and calls for extra-constitutional quick fixes have not been heeded.”