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

Mr Speaker, I am happy to ignore the interjection but it is impossible to ignore his complete indifference. I assume that that reflects the attitude of those opposite. It is now crystal clear that there are very grave doubts about the result so far as the Iranian election is concerned. Two of the main challengers, Mr Mousavi and the former speaker, Mr Karroubi, have indicated that they want the election result to be cancelled. The main challenger, Mr Mousavi, has filed an official complaint against the election result and he has been joined in that respect by the third challenger, Mr Razai. Australia, as with other members of the international community, is watching these developments very carefully and closely. We urge the Iranian authorities, the Iranian government, to ensure that the issues raised by the three challengers are dealt with promptly and transparently. We very strongly hope that the commitment made by the Supreme Leader that these matters will be reviewed leads to a thorough and transparent review and investigation.

In some respects more importantly—and hence my riposte to the member opposite—we are gravely concerned about both the reports and the images of the serious human rights abuses we have seen on camera and in photos in the last 24 to 36 hours in Tehran. That is why I admonish the member opposite. We are very gravely concerned about the very serious breaches of human rights we have seen. We join the UN Secretary-General, we join President Obama and we join our colleges from the European Union and the United Kingdom in underlining very seriously our condemnation of these events and our call for restraint by the Iranian authorities. That is why I admonish the member opposite—for his complete indifference on human rights matters. We urge the Iranian government to—

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