Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Kennedy for his question. The Australian government—and I'm sure I speak on behalf of everyone in this House—shares the grief and the frustration of the families of the 43 Australian servicemen missing in action after the Korean War of 1950-1953.

An official list of all missing in action was released in 1953. It was in fact published in the media of the day. I have a copy of an article from The Sydney Morning Herald in mid-1953 which lists those missing in action under various categories, both Air Force and Army. It lists them as either 'confirmed POWs, confirmed killed, confirmed wounded' or 'believed POWs, believed killed, believed wounded'. In fact, Flying Officer Gillan is listed on this as 'missing, believed POW'.

Successive Australian governments have sought to ascertain the status of all 43 missing in action but, at the time, the North Korean regime did not confirm their status. I know that successive Australian governments have continued to make inquiries. In fact, I instigated exhaustive inquiries, through the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, with the US and South Korean governments. I responded to the relative of Flying Officer Gillan, courtesy of your office, in writing in October 2016 to confirm that no further information had been made available.

The tragic truth is that the only authority which would have more information, or could have more information, is the North Korean regime. We have very limited diplomatic engagement with North Korea, and that's been the case for some time. Nevertheless, our embassy in Seoul has continued to make representations to the North Korean government about our missing in action as recently as March this year.

The summit meeting between President Trump and Kim Jong-un, and the declaration that was signed that specifically refers to the repatriation of the remains of POWs and missing in action, does give us some hope that there will be a final resolution of the status of the Australian Defence servicemen. Our Defence personnel remain in constant contact with our counterparts in the United States, and I personally raised this issue with the acting ambassador of the United States during the course of this week.

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