Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

This year marks the 30th anniversary of the 1991 Paris Peace Agreements that brought peace to Cambodia after 25 years of catastrophic civil war, invasion and genocide. In 1975, as the war was ending in Vietnam, the Khmer Rouge took control in Cambodia and embarked on a horrific campaign of executions, displacement and forced labour in which nearly two million were murdered or died of disease and starvation. The invasion of Vietnamese forces in 1979 drove Pol Pot's regime from power but began a new decade of destructive civil war. With the country desperately divided internally, and ASEAN, China, Russia and the United States all supporting different sides, the conflict proved utterly intractable—until Australia's foreign minister, Gareth Evans, identified a new way forward, in 1989, built around giving the United Nations an unprecedented role in governing the country in its transition.

The detailed plan that Gareth and his department drafted—and pursued with relentless diplomacy, working closely with Indonesia in particular—culminated in the Paris Peace Agreements signed by 19 countries on 23 October 1991. These agreements are among the greatest achievements of Australian foreign policy. As Gareth Evans said at the time:

Peace and freedom are not prizes which, once gained, can never be lost. They must be won again each day. Their foundations must be sunk deep into the bedrock of political stability, economic prosperity and, above all, the observance of human rights.

Indeed, we still hope that the achievement of peace can be matched, as has not been the case so far, with the achievements of democratic pluralism, inclusion and respect for human rights for all Cambodians. Australia takes inspiration from the courage and resilience of the Cambodian people and will always be a strong supporter of their aspirations for not only a durable peace but a just peace.