Belinda Neal (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Foreign Affairs. Will the minister advise the House of the strength of Australia’s alliance with the United States?

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

I thank the member for Robertson for that question. It gives me the opportunity to again underline the fundamental importance and the long-term, enduring nature of the alliance relationship between Australia and the United States. This is an alliance which has served both nation-states well, an alliance forged by Labor Prime Minister John Curtin at a time of our greatest peril. It is an alliance which has lasted for over 50 years and is now part of Australia’s indispensable strategic, security and defence arrangements. The alliance transcends either governments in this nation or administrations in the United States, whether it is Labor or Liberal here or Democrat or Republican in the United States.

In January of this year I visited the United States. I met with Secretary of State Rice, my counterpart; Vice-President Cheney; and also the Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates. Both in our private exchanges and publicly, the Secretary of State and I underlined both Australia’s and the United States’s long-term, enduring commitment to the fundamental and indispensable nature of our alliance relationship.

I also took the opportunity of informing the United States administration of our election commitment to withdraw our combat troops from Iraq by the middle of this year. That is now being done in close consultation with the United States and also with the United Kingdom. I have made the point, which is clear for all to see, that this carrying out of our election commitment in no way disturbs the fundamental nature of our alliance relationship. I also took the opportunity while I was in Washington to invite the Secretary of State to visit Perth and I was very pleased to be able to announce that she had indicated she would so do.

In terms of the ongoing business of the alliance, I am pleased to inform the House that in Canberra on Saturday, 23 February, Australia will formally host this year’s Australia-US Ministerial consultations, or the AUSMIN consultations as they are known. My colleague the Minister for Defence, Mr Fitzgibbon, and I will formally host the consultations on behalf of Australia and the Secretary of Defense, Mr Gates, and the Deputy Secretary of State, Mr Negroponte, will formally represent the United States. This is the first occasion since December 2006 that we have had the AUSMIN consultations. The December 2006 consultations were held in Washington and in November 2005 the last consultations were conducted in Australia.

The AUSMIN consultations are the primary vehicle for pursuing the ongoing strategic arrangements so far as our alliance is concerned. We exchange insights on regional and global strategic matters and on security challenges. We discuss furthering our security and defence cooperation arrangements. It also gives us the opportunity to discuss matters of interest, including our own area, the Asia-Pacific.

I also indicate that in the course of the AUSMIN consultations I will take the opportunity of reporting to Secretary of Defense Gates and Deputy Secretary of State Negroponte of my trip tomorrow to the Solomon Islands to have consultations with the Solomon Islands government, with Prime Minister Sikua and his ministers, and also to take part in the first ministerial forum review of the RAMSI operation, the Regional Assistance Mission to Solomon Islands, an important responsibility which Australia is only to happy to discharge in our area of the world.