Stephen Smith (Perth, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for her interest and concern in respect of this case, as I do many members of both sides of the House. I welcome very much the fact that last week the King of Thailand granted Mr Nicolaides a pardon. I am sure all members of the House will be very pleased that over the weekend he was returned to Australia and to his family. This of course has been a deeply distressing time for him and for members of his family; in particular, for his elderly parents, who have found this situation quite traumatic.

From the moment that Mr Nicolaides was taken into custody on 31 August last year he received consular assistance from our officials in Thailand, from the ambassador down, and his family members received consular assistance from our officials in Australia. The government strongly supported his application for pardon once the Thai judicial and legal processes had been completed. I raised the matter on a number of occasions with my Thai counterpart, requesting that it be given early and favourable consideration. We are very grateful that the Thai authorities have processed this matter very quickly. Indeed, it is a measure of the good relationship between Australia and Thailand. I am advised by officials that, in the paperwork associated with the pardon, reference is made to the granting of the pardon having as one of its reasons the good and friendly relationship between Australia and Thailand.

Mr Nicolaides was sentenced on 19 January to three years imprisonment, his application for pardon was made two days later on the 21st, the pardon was granted on Wednesday of last week, paperwork was completed on Friday of last week and he returned to Australia, as members would know, over the weekend. On behalf of the House, I thank very much our ambassador and our officials in Thailand for their very good work in this matter. Their consular assistance to Mr Nicolaides went from the moment of his arrest until he got on the plane on Saturday.

I also acknowledge members on both sides of the House for their interest, for their concern and, very importantly, for their understanding of the way in which the government was seeking to promote, pursue and advance Mr Nicolaides’s interests. His case underlines the very important point which I have made to the House before: when an Australian citizen becomes involved in the legal, criminal and judicial processes of another nation there is a limit to what the Australian government can do—not that we cannot do anything, but there is a limit.

In the course of Mr Nicolaides’s judicial processes before the Thai criminal system I had urgings from members of the Australian legal profession to seek to interfere in those processes, including in the granting of bail. If these suggestions were made by foreign governments in respect of Australian court processes there would be at least the raising of an eyebrow, and if these suggestions were made of the Australian government in respect of Australian bail processes that would either be highly inappropriate or possibly a serious criminal offence.

I was also invited on more than one occasion by legal practitioners, academics or historians to be highly critical of the Thai legal and judicial system and to be highly critical of the offence in respect of which Mr Nicolaides was charged. I chose not to go down that path. I chose not to go down that path because Australia respects the right of the sovereign nation-state of Thailand to organise its internal domestic laws in the manner it sees fit. If I had been critical of the Thai judicial system or of the offence in question, I think that would not have helped the application for clemency once it was made.

I conclude on this point: when Australians travel overseas they need to ensure that they both are aware of and comply with the laws of the country to which they travel. If for some reason they believe that those laws are either obscurantist or inappropriate and they do not propose to comply with them then they should not travel to that country in the first place. Just as we expect others when they come here to comply with our laws and to abide by our customs and processes, so equally Australians need to adopt the same approach when they travel overseas. In that respect, I again urge all Australians travelling overseas to consult the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade travel advisory system and to register their travel prior to travelling overseas.

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