as posted here ... Supporters rally against the deportation of black listed Muslim cleric sheik Mansour Leghaei | The Australian
HUNDREDS of protesters opposed to the government's decision to expel Iranian sheik Mansour Leghaei from Australia will rally in Canberra on Thursday ahead of the Muslim cleric's June 28 deportation
Dr Leghaei, cleric at the Shia Imam Husain Islamic Centre, at Earlwood in Sydney's inner west, has four weeks left in the country following Immigration Minister Chris Evans's decision not to overrule ASIO's adverse security assessment of him.
The United Nations Human Rights Committee has told the federal government the deportation is a possible violation of Dr Leghaei's human rights, and has given it a June 21 deadline to respond to the claim.
ASIO alleges Dr Leghaei carried out "acts of foreign interference", but the spy agency is not required to reveal details of its allegations under laws governing national security.
Dr Leghaei, who has lived in Australia for the past 16 years, said despite events reaching the 11th hour, he was still hopeful the UN could instigate a reversal of the government's decision.
"The community doesn't really accept the decision and we are doing whatever we can do," Dr Leghaei said. "The rest is in the hands of God, really."
public news and things I spy ..
Monday, 31 May 2010
Jewish Issues Watchdog: Expelling Israeli diplomat was a confected, self-serving exercise
as posted here ... Jewish Issues Watchdog: Expelling Israeli diplomat was a confected, self-serving exercise
Australian Foreign Minister, Stephen Smith announced the "confected, hypocritical, self-serving" expulsion on Monday, the first day of parliament's new sitting, the day it was likely to face its heaviest pasting over the resource super-profits tax; just as the earlier outburst of confected anger against Israel coincided with a spike in the pink batts controversy. It is "very low-grade behaviour to ruin a key relationship such as that with Israel for domestic political advantage."
From: The Australian May 29, 2010 by Greg Sheridan, Foreign editor:
...this week... Kevin Rudd's government [expelled] an Israeli diplomat over the Dubai passports affair ...
"It was an over reaction," [Opposition leader Tony] Abbott says.
"Sure Britain has done this but other nations whose passports were misused have not.
"I think we need to understand that Israel lives in a far more dangerous world than the rest of us. Sincere friendship means an honest understanding of the dangers they face.
"I don't condone the misuse of Australian passports. The big difference between Israel and almost every other country is that Israel is under existential threat."
There is now a greater difference between the main parties over Israel than at any time since Gough Whitlam.
The Abbott-led Liberal Party is now much more deeply committed to the Israel relationship than the Rudd-led Labor Party.
Rudd's policy towards Israel mirrors his policy towards an Emissions Trading Scheme - an extravagant and emotional level of promise, followed by a complete failure of delivery, marred by short-term political expediency.
This is a tough judgment, but it is the only one that fits the facts.
The Hamas terrorist leader Mahmoud al-Mabhouh was assassinated in Dubai earlier this year, almost certainly by Mossad agents. They used Australian, British, French and Irish passports.
First to the morality of the operation. Mabhouh was a leader of Hamas, which is pledged to Israel's violent destruction. He had much innocent blood on his hands. His assassination is morally exactly the same as when an Australian SAS unit targets an al-Qa'ida leader for attack in Afghanistan, as the SAS has often done. It is an even closer parallel to US drones hitting a terrorist in a border area of Pakistan. US President Barack Obama has decided, with Australian support, that merely fleeing the conflict zone of Afghanistan to the haven of Pakistan will not prevent an al-Qa'ida or Taliban terrorist being killed by US forces. So any Canberra moral outrage at the Israeli operation, which Foreign Minister Stephen Smith describes without qualification, or sophistication, as murder, is hypocritical and confected. Objecting to the misuse of Australian passports is entirely reasonable. But the manner in which the Rudd government has effected the expulsion demonstrates cynicism and short-term political opportunism.
When the passport misuse was first revealed in February, the Rudd government made a great song and dance about it. Emotions ran high. The government in effect sooled the Australian media on to savage Israel. It made sure there were cameras outside the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade when the Israeli ambassador, Yuval Rotem, was summoned for a ritual dressing down.
For six weeks, the Israelis were cast into diplomatic outer darkness. There was no dialogue of substance between Canberra and Jerusalem. Then suddenly there was a thaw. As part of its initial response the government sent a delegation of Australian Federal Police to Israel. This was all show - and a pretty poor show given their well-publicised problems with Israeli traffic - as the AFP could tell the government nothing more than it already knew. The Israelis did the operation but there is no proof.
The long delay of three months with nothing happening, and the deliberate resumption of diplomatic dialogue, led the Israelis, and Israel's friends in Australia, to believe the government was going low key. Then, all of a sudden, some internal dynamic changed and a couple of weeks ago, the government sent ASIO director David Irvine to Israel. Irvine is an official of the highest possible quality. But his trip, and the fact that Smith this week publicised it, represents an overt politicisation of ASIO by the government. The Irvine trip, which could produce nothing more than the AFP trip, gave the government cover for the expulsion. The manner and timing of the expulsion reflect very poorly on Rudd.
The government decided to announce the expulsion on Monday, the first day of parliament's new sitting. This was the day it was likely to face its heaviest pasting over the resource super-profits tax, just as the earlier outburst of confected anger against Israel coincided with a spike in the pink batts controversy.
This is a government obsessed with the management of the daily media cycle. The Opposition's foreign affairs spokeswoman, Julie Bishop, instinctively supported Israel but did so incompetently and gave the government more opportunity for confected outrage. But it is very low-grade behaviour to ruin a key relationship such as that with Israel for domestic political advantage.
Smith claimed that he was taking the action to expel an Israeli more in sorrow than in anger.
But Smith made his statement in parliament to get the greatest possible media. Although the government had all the information it needed for any action for months, there was a sense of rush at the last minute. Bishop was rung at 11.30am and abruptly told senior officials were on their way to her office to brief her. The officials were in her office while Smith was making his noon statement. The Israeli embassy was not told of the impending expulsion until 11am.
This is a great contrast to the British behaviour. When the British expulsion was announced, the Israeli diplomat was already back home. If you are doing something to an old friend, more in sorrow than in anger, surely you tell the old friend first.
Similarly, it is a great breach of normal practice for a friendly country to publicise the visit of an agency head, such as Irvine. The fact the government publicised the visit is a politicisation of ASIO. It is the government using a national security smokescreen to cover what is entirely a political decision.
Smith also let it be known that the Israeli to be expelled was the Mossad chief in Canberra. In 2006, under the Howard government, Australia and Israel decided to station senior intelligence people in each others' countries. There was a Mossad officer among the Israeli diplomats in Canberra and an ASIO person in the Australian embassy in Tel Aviv. These are declared positions of friendly agencies. They don't spy on each other, but work together.
Australia and Israel for many years have had close intelligence exchanges. The chiefs of our other intelligence agencies also visit Israel, but quietly, and gain an enormous amount of information and insight from every visit. We also send senior national security personnel from across a number of agencies for short courses.
Smith said intelligence co-operation between Canberra and Jerusalem would now cool for an indefinite period. This will be entirely to our detriment. Despite the recent difficulties, not least its agents being filmed in Dubai, kilo for kilo, the Mossad is without question the best intelligence agency in the world.
Australia has significant interests in Iraq, is acutely concerned with Iran, and will, according to our own Counter-Terrorism White Paper, quite likely be a target of Hezbollah terrorism. On all these subjects no country is better informed than Israel. At this stage, Israel has not asked the ASIO representative to go home. Nor is it clear how long the ban on a Mossad agent coming to Canberra will be enforced. Equally, it is not clear Israel will bother sending a Mossad officer to Australia.
This whole sequence has the hallmarks not of an intelligence operation but a Hawker-Britton operation, the Rudd government using one of the most sensitive relationships Australia has to distract the media from the political agenda.
Julie Bishop's clumsiness helped the government. She was mistaken to stress it's not proven whether the Israelis did the operation and she was mistaken to answer yes to the idea that Australia also forges passports, even though I have reported this on two occasions in The Australian and Smith would not deny it at his press conference.
Some context is important. Australian intelligence agents, but also police and others associated with combating drug smuggling and the like, often travel on false Australian passports, that is, passports that do not carry their true identities. That is almost routine.
Much more rare, but not entirely unheard of, is using the passport of another nation. However, it's easy to construct a scenario where this might happen. Say, hypothetically, Canberra wanted to send an ASIS agent of Pakistani origin to Pakistan for an operation and didn't want any indication of an Australian presence. Such an agent might use a Pakistani passport. It's unlikely Australia would forge the passport itself as this is difficult and resource intensive. Instead it would probably borrow such a passport from the British, known to be master forgers, or the Americans.
The government's outrage against Bishop was entirely confected.
The government also suggested the Israelis had broken a specific agreement with Australia over passports. This is almost certainly untrue. The Israelis don't acknowledge their passport forgeries and to promise not to do it again can only be predicated on them having done it in the first place. No Howard government minister has any recollection of any such agreement.
The Israelis operate in a unique environment. They have to undertake operations in the Middle East. But use of an Israeli passport in most Middle East countries is impossible. So they are forced to use other passports.
Israel is incredibly beleaguered at the moment. It has never been under such sustained political attack. In many parts of the world, anti-Israel sentiment is morphing into traditional anti-Semitism. By making such a cynical and exuberant public relations bonanza out of this episode, the Rudd government is directly licensing the recrudescence of the worst sentiments imaginable. I can't conceive that this would have been Dietrich Bonhoeffer's way.
The government dismayed many of its own supporters, who took its previous rhetoric about friendship with Israel seriously. Michael Danby is the Labor member for the critical Melbourne seat of Melbourne Ports.
He is in no sense a marginal figure in Labor. He is a former secretary of Labor's national security committee, a former Labor whip, and the chairman of the parliamentary foreign affairs sub-committee, that is the most senior parliamentarian, outside the ministry, on foreign affairs.
Yesterday, he said: "The expulsion was the wrong policy response. Even if there was some obscure previous incident, Berlin and Paris are as sophisticated as the mandarins of Canberra and their reaction (no expulsion) demonstrates why we did not have to ape the British Foreign Office. Stephen Smith should have made a recommendation to the NSC having the more worldly overview, that this harsh proscription would feed the international campaign of delegitimation of Israel.
This harsh reaction by Australia comes just at a time when we want the Israelis to be as flexible as possible in the new peace talks with the Arabs. This folly, this over reaction, has unwittingly encouraged bigots elsewhere, who have their secret passions sanctioned. I have suggested a series of steps to the Prime Minister to overcome this successful attempt to blot Labor's copybook just weeks before an election."
That's what the government's friends think of it.
Australian Foreign Minister, Stephen Smith announced the "confected, hypocritical, self-serving" expulsion on Monday, the first day of parliament's new sitting, the day it was likely to face its heaviest pasting over the resource super-profits tax; just as the earlier outburst of confected anger against Israel coincided with a spike in the pink batts controversy. It is "very low-grade behaviour to ruin a key relationship such as that with Israel for domestic political advantage."
From: The Australian May 29, 2010 by Greg Sheridan, Foreign editor:
...this week... Kevin Rudd's government [expelled] an Israeli diplomat over the Dubai passports affair ...
"It was an over reaction," [Opposition leader Tony] Abbott says.
"Sure Britain has done this but other nations whose passports were misused have not.
"I think we need to understand that Israel lives in a far more dangerous world than the rest of us. Sincere friendship means an honest understanding of the dangers they face.
"I don't condone the misuse of Australian passports. The big difference between Israel and almost every other country is that Israel is under existential threat."
There is now a greater difference between the main parties over Israel than at any time since Gough Whitlam.
The Abbott-led Liberal Party is now much more deeply committed to the Israel relationship than the Rudd-led Labor Party.
Rudd's policy towards Israel mirrors his policy towards an Emissions Trading Scheme - an extravagant and emotional level of promise, followed by a complete failure of delivery, marred by short-term political expediency.
This is a tough judgment, but it is the only one that fits the facts.
The Hamas terrorist leader Mahmoud al-Mabhouh was assassinated in Dubai earlier this year, almost certainly by Mossad agents. They used Australian, British, French and Irish passports.
First to the morality of the operation. Mabhouh was a leader of Hamas, which is pledged to Israel's violent destruction. He had much innocent blood on his hands. His assassination is morally exactly the same as when an Australian SAS unit targets an al-Qa'ida leader for attack in Afghanistan, as the SAS has often done. It is an even closer parallel to US drones hitting a terrorist in a border area of Pakistan. US President Barack Obama has decided, with Australian support, that merely fleeing the conflict zone of Afghanistan to the haven of Pakistan will not prevent an al-Qa'ida or Taliban terrorist being killed by US forces. So any Canberra moral outrage at the Israeli operation, which Foreign Minister Stephen Smith describes without qualification, or sophistication, as murder, is hypocritical and confected. Objecting to the misuse of Australian passports is entirely reasonable. But the manner in which the Rudd government has effected the expulsion demonstrates cynicism and short-term political opportunism.
When the passport misuse was first revealed in February, the Rudd government made a great song and dance about it. Emotions ran high. The government in effect sooled the Australian media on to savage Israel. It made sure there were cameras outside the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade when the Israeli ambassador, Yuval Rotem, was summoned for a ritual dressing down.
For six weeks, the Israelis were cast into diplomatic outer darkness. There was no dialogue of substance between Canberra and Jerusalem. Then suddenly there was a thaw. As part of its initial response the government sent a delegation of Australian Federal Police to Israel. This was all show - and a pretty poor show given their well-publicised problems with Israeli traffic - as the AFP could tell the government nothing more than it already knew. The Israelis did the operation but there is no proof.
The long delay of three months with nothing happening, and the deliberate resumption of diplomatic dialogue, led the Israelis, and Israel's friends in Australia, to believe the government was going low key. Then, all of a sudden, some internal dynamic changed and a couple of weeks ago, the government sent ASIO director David Irvine to Israel. Irvine is an official of the highest possible quality. But his trip, and the fact that Smith this week publicised it, represents an overt politicisation of ASIO by the government. The Irvine trip, which could produce nothing more than the AFP trip, gave the government cover for the expulsion. The manner and timing of the expulsion reflect very poorly on Rudd.
The government decided to announce the expulsion on Monday, the first day of parliament's new sitting. This was the day it was likely to face its heaviest pasting over the resource super-profits tax, just as the earlier outburst of confected anger against Israel coincided with a spike in the pink batts controversy.
This is a government obsessed with the management of the daily media cycle. The Opposition's foreign affairs spokeswoman, Julie Bishop, instinctively supported Israel but did so incompetently and gave the government more opportunity for confected outrage. But it is very low-grade behaviour to ruin a key relationship such as that with Israel for domestic political advantage.
Smith claimed that he was taking the action to expel an Israeli more in sorrow than in anger.
But Smith made his statement in parliament to get the greatest possible media. Although the government had all the information it needed for any action for months, there was a sense of rush at the last minute. Bishop was rung at 11.30am and abruptly told senior officials were on their way to her office to brief her. The officials were in her office while Smith was making his noon statement. The Israeli embassy was not told of the impending expulsion until 11am.
This is a great contrast to the British behaviour. When the British expulsion was announced, the Israeli diplomat was already back home. If you are doing something to an old friend, more in sorrow than in anger, surely you tell the old friend first.
Similarly, it is a great breach of normal practice for a friendly country to publicise the visit of an agency head, such as Irvine. The fact the government publicised the visit is a politicisation of ASIO. It is the government using a national security smokescreen to cover what is entirely a political decision.
Smith also let it be known that the Israeli to be expelled was the Mossad chief in Canberra. In 2006, under the Howard government, Australia and Israel decided to station senior intelligence people in each others' countries. There was a Mossad officer among the Israeli diplomats in Canberra and an ASIO person in the Australian embassy in Tel Aviv. These are declared positions of friendly agencies. They don't spy on each other, but work together.
Australia and Israel for many years have had close intelligence exchanges. The chiefs of our other intelligence agencies also visit Israel, but quietly, and gain an enormous amount of information and insight from every visit. We also send senior national security personnel from across a number of agencies for short courses.
Smith said intelligence co-operation between Canberra and Jerusalem would now cool for an indefinite period. This will be entirely to our detriment. Despite the recent difficulties, not least its agents being filmed in Dubai, kilo for kilo, the Mossad is without question the best intelligence agency in the world.
Australia has significant interests in Iraq, is acutely concerned with Iran, and will, according to our own Counter-Terrorism White Paper, quite likely be a target of Hezbollah terrorism. On all these subjects no country is better informed than Israel. At this stage, Israel has not asked the ASIO representative to go home. Nor is it clear how long the ban on a Mossad agent coming to Canberra will be enforced. Equally, it is not clear Israel will bother sending a Mossad officer to Australia.
This whole sequence has the hallmarks not of an intelligence operation but a Hawker-Britton operation, the Rudd government using one of the most sensitive relationships Australia has to distract the media from the political agenda.
Julie Bishop's clumsiness helped the government. She was mistaken to stress it's not proven whether the Israelis did the operation and she was mistaken to answer yes to the idea that Australia also forges passports, even though I have reported this on two occasions in The Australian and Smith would not deny it at his press conference.
Some context is important. Australian intelligence agents, but also police and others associated with combating drug smuggling and the like, often travel on false Australian passports, that is, passports that do not carry their true identities. That is almost routine.
Much more rare, but not entirely unheard of, is using the passport of another nation. However, it's easy to construct a scenario where this might happen. Say, hypothetically, Canberra wanted to send an ASIS agent of Pakistani origin to Pakistan for an operation and didn't want any indication of an Australian presence. Such an agent might use a Pakistani passport. It's unlikely Australia would forge the passport itself as this is difficult and resource intensive. Instead it would probably borrow such a passport from the British, known to be master forgers, or the Americans.
The government's outrage against Bishop was entirely confected.
The government also suggested the Israelis had broken a specific agreement with Australia over passports. This is almost certainly untrue. The Israelis don't acknowledge their passport forgeries and to promise not to do it again can only be predicated on them having done it in the first place. No Howard government minister has any recollection of any such agreement.
The Israelis operate in a unique environment. They have to undertake operations in the Middle East. But use of an Israeli passport in most Middle East countries is impossible. So they are forced to use other passports.
Israel is incredibly beleaguered at the moment. It has never been under such sustained political attack. In many parts of the world, anti-Israel sentiment is morphing into traditional anti-Semitism. By making such a cynical and exuberant public relations bonanza out of this episode, the Rudd government is directly licensing the recrudescence of the worst sentiments imaginable. I can't conceive that this would have been Dietrich Bonhoeffer's way.
The government dismayed many of its own supporters, who took its previous rhetoric about friendship with Israel seriously. Michael Danby is the Labor member for the critical Melbourne seat of Melbourne Ports.
He is in no sense a marginal figure in Labor. He is a former secretary of Labor's national security committee, a former Labor whip, and the chairman of the parliamentary foreign affairs sub-committee, that is the most senior parliamentarian, outside the ministry, on foreign affairs.
Yesterday, he said: "The expulsion was the wrong policy response. Even if there was some obscure previous incident, Berlin and Paris are as sophisticated as the mandarins of Canberra and their reaction (no expulsion) demonstrates why we did not have to ape the British Foreign Office. Stephen Smith should have made a recommendation to the NSC having the more worldly overview, that this harsh proscription would feed the international campaign of delegitimation of Israel.
This harsh reaction by Australia comes just at a time when we want the Israelis to be as flexible as possible in the new peace talks with the Arabs. This folly, this over reaction, has unwittingly encouraged bigots elsewhere, who have their secret passions sanctioned. I have suggested a series of steps to the Prime Minister to overcome this successful attempt to blot Labor's copybook just weeks before an election."
That's what the government's friends think of it.
Julie Bishop: The Price of Lies and Moral Failure.
as posted here ... Julie Bishop: The Price of Lies and Moral Failure.
Australia, May 31, (Pal Telegraph) The opposition’s foreign minister, Julie Bishop, has been prepared to compromise national security in her desperate attempts to maintain a blind pro-Israel stance, says Asem Judeh, human rights activist and Israeli Terrorism Monitor founder. “So desperate is Bishop to maintain Zionist lies, she has been prepared to breach the Commonwealth Crimes Act.
This is the price of throwing away all sense of right and wrong to make a cowardly point.”
Judeh says Bishop’s claim that it was an over reaction to expel an Israeli diplomat in response to the stealing of Australian passports to assassinate a Palestinian in Dubai was cynical and immoral. “What will it actually take for her and her colleagues to find fault with Israel? There was no adverse comment about the bombing of Gaza. No criticism about the continual taking of Palestinian land. No comment about the stealing of Australians’ passports for extra-judicial assassination. And what does get reaction? The small and symbolic act of expelling an Israeli diplomat.
Describing it as an "over-reaction" is either blind anti-Arab prejudice or cynical pandering to Zionists.”
Judeh says Bishop deliberately mis-represented the decision to expel the diplomat. “The problem was that the passports were used for illegal assassination. Bishop chose to represent it as just falsifying of passports. It was deliberate distortion. Then she got herself into trouble by compromising national security. If she was a public servant and had said that she would have been charged.”
Judeh says the behaviour of Bishop is part of a general pattern. Those supposedly in charge of national security have fallen so much under the Israeli position they are prepared to compromise national security. “Imagine if Arab person had said what Bishop said. There would be massive criticism about the dangers to Australian society. But if these things are said in defence of Israel, it is considered alright. The same double standards are happening with ASIO and the Australian Federal Police. In the end they all get lost in their lies.”
Judeh says Bishop should be held responsible for her actions. "It is time to expose ASIO’s contempt of parliament. It is time for those who supposedly represent Australia’s interests to do it properly."
Israeli Terrorism Monitor
Australia, May 31, (Pal Telegraph) The opposition’s foreign minister, Julie Bishop, has been prepared to compromise national security in her desperate attempts to maintain a blind pro-Israel stance, says Asem Judeh, human rights activist and Israeli Terrorism Monitor founder. “So desperate is Bishop to maintain Zionist lies, she has been prepared to breach the Commonwealth Crimes Act.
This is the price of throwing away all sense of right and wrong to make a cowardly point.”
Judeh says Bishop’s claim that it was an over reaction to expel an Israeli diplomat in response to the stealing of Australian passports to assassinate a Palestinian in Dubai was cynical and immoral. “What will it actually take for her and her colleagues to find fault with Israel? There was no adverse comment about the bombing of Gaza. No criticism about the continual taking of Palestinian land. No comment about the stealing of Australians’ passports for extra-judicial assassination. And what does get reaction? The small and symbolic act of expelling an Israeli diplomat.
Describing it as an "over-reaction" is either blind anti-Arab prejudice or cynical pandering to Zionists.”
Judeh says Bishop deliberately mis-represented the decision to expel the diplomat. “The problem was that the passports were used for illegal assassination. Bishop chose to represent it as just falsifying of passports. It was deliberate distortion. Then she got herself into trouble by compromising national security. If she was a public servant and had said that she would have been charged.”
Judeh says the behaviour of Bishop is part of a general pattern. Those supposedly in charge of national security have fallen so much under the Israeli position they are prepared to compromise national security. “Imagine if Arab person had said what Bishop said. There would be massive criticism about the dangers to Australian society. But if these things are said in defence of Israel, it is considered alright. The same double standards are happening with ASIO and the Australian Federal Police. In the end they all get lost in their lies.”
Judeh says Bishop should be held responsible for her actions. "It is time to expose ASIO’s contempt of parliament. It is time for those who supposedly represent Australia’s interests to do it properly."
Israeli Terrorism Monitor
Saturday, 29 May 2010
The West, Islam and Sharia: Greg Sheridan: Expelling Israeli diplomat was a confected, self-serving exercise
as posted here ... The West, Islam and Sharia: Greg Sheridan: Expelling Israeli diplomat was a confected, self-serving exercise
THE Earth moved between Israel and Australia this week, with Kevin Rudd's government expelling an Israeli diplomat over the Dubai passports affair, and it may be that the Earth moved in Australian politics as well.
In an interview with me, Opposition leader Tony Abbott has condemned the expulsion.
"It was an over reaction," Abbott says.
"Sure Britain has done this but other nations whose passports were misused have not.
"I think we need to understand that Israel lives in a far more dangerous world than the rest of us. Sincere friendship means an honest understanding of the dangers they face.
"I don't condone the misuse of Australian passports. The big difference between Israel and almost every other country is that Israel is under existential threat."
There is now a greater difference between the main parties over Israel than at any time since Gough Whitlam.
The Abbott-led Liberal Party is now much more deeply committed to the Israel relationship than the Rudd-led Labor Party.
Rudd's policy towards Israel mirrors his policy towards an Emissions Trading Scheme - an extravagant and emotional level of promise, followed by a complete failure of delivery, marred by short-term political expediency.
This is a tough judgment, but it is the only one that fits the facts.
The Hamas terrorist leader Mahmoud al-Mabhouh was assassinated in Dubai earlier this year, almost certainly by Mossad agents. They used Australian, British, French and Irish passports.
First to the morality of the operation. Mabhouh was a leader of Hamas, which is pledged to Israel's violent destruction. He had much innocent blood on his hands. His assassination is morally exactly the same as when an Australian SAS unit targets an al-Qa'ida leader for attack in Afghanistan, as the SAS has often done.
It is an even closer parallel to US drones hitting a terrorist in a border area of Pakistan.
US President Barack Obama has decided, with Australian support, that merely fleeing the conflict zone of Afghanistan to the haven of Pakistan will not prevent an al-Qa'ida or Taliban terrorist being killed by US forces. So any Canberra moral outrage at the Israeli operation, which Foreign Minister Stephen Smith describes without qualification, or sophistication, as murder, is hypocritical and confected.
Objecting to the misuse of Australian passports is entirely reasonable. But the manner in which the Rudd government has effected the expulsion demonstrates cynicism and short-term political opportunism.
When the passport misuse was first revealed in February, the Rudd government made a great song and dance about it. Emotions ran high. The government in effect sooled the Australian media on to savage Israel. It made sure there were cameras outside the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade when the Israeli ambassador, Yuval Rotem, was summoned for a ritual dressing down.
For six weeks, the Israelis were cast into diplomatic outer darkness. There was no dialogue of substance between Canberra and Jerusalem. Then suddenly there was a thaw.
As part of its initial response the government sent a delegation of Australian Federal Police to Israel. This was all show - and a pretty poor show given their well-publicised problems with Israeli traffic - as the AFP could tell the government nothing more than it already knew. The Israelis did the operation but there is no proof.
The long delay of three months with nothing happening, and the deliberate resumption of diplomatic dialogue, led the Israelis, and Israel's friends in Australia, to believe the government was going low key. Then, all of a sudden, some internal dynamic changed and a couple of weeks ago, the government sent ASIO director David Irvine to Israel.
Irvine is an official of the highest possible quality. But his trip, and the fact that Smith this week publicised it, represents an overt politicisation of ASIO by the government. The Irvine trip, which could produce nothing more than the AFP trip, gave the government cover for the expulsion. The manner and timing of the expulsion reflect very poorly on Rudd.
The government decided to announce the expulsion on Monday, the first day of parliament's new sitting. This was the day it was likely to face its heaviest pasting over the resource super-profits tax, just as the earlier outburst of confected anger against Israel coincided with a spike in the pink batts controversy.
This is a government obsessed with the management of the daily media cycle. The Opposition's foreign affairs spokeswoman, Julie Bishop, instinctively supported Israel but did so incompetently and gave the government more opportunity for confected outrage. But it is very low-grade behaviour to ruin a key relationship such as that with Israel for domestic political advantage.
Smith claimed that he was taking the action to expel an Israeli more in sorrow than in anger.
But Smith made his statement in parliament to get the greatest possible media. Although the government had all the information it needed for any action for months, there was a sense of rush at the last minute. Bishop was rung at 11.30am and abruptly told senior officials were on their way to her office to brief her. The officials were in her office while Smith was making his noon statement.
The Israeli embassy was not told of the impending expulsion until 11am.
This is a great contrast to the British behaviour. When the British expulsion was announced, the Israeli diplomat was already back home. If you are doing something to an old friend, more in sorrow than in anger, surely you tell the old friend first.
Similarly, it is a great breach of normal practice for a friendly country to publicise the visit of an agency head, such as Irvine. The fact the government publicised the visit is a politicisation of ASIO. It is the government using a national security smokescreen to cover what is entirely a political decision.
Smith also let it be known that the Israeli to be expelled was the Mossad chief in Canberra. In 2006, under the Howard government, Australia and Israel decided to station senior intelligence people in each others' countries. There was a Mossad officer among the Israeli diplomats in Canberra and an ASIO person in the Australian embassy in Tel Aviv. These are declared positions of friendly agencies. They don't spy on each other, but work together.
Australia and Israel for many years have had close intelligence exchanges. The chiefs of our other intelligence agencies also visit Israel, but quietly, and gain an enormous amount of information and insight from every visit. We also send senior national security personnel from across a number of agencies for short courses.
Smith said intelligence co-operation between Canberra and Jerusalem would now cool for an indefinite period. This will be entirely to our detriment. Despite the recent difficulties, not least its agents being filmed in Dubai, kilo for kilo, the Mossad is without question the best intelligence agency in the world.
Australia has significant interests in Iraq, is acutely concerned with Iran, and will, according to our own Counter-Terrorism White Paper, quite likely be a target of Hezbollah terrorism. On all these subjects no country is better informed than Israel. At this stage, Israel has not asked the ASIO representative to go home. Nor is it clear how long the ban on a Mossad agent coming to Canberra will be enforced. Equally, it is not clear Israel will bother sending a Mossad officer to Australia.
This whole sequence has the hallmarks not of an intelligence operation but a Hawker-Britton operation, the Rudd government using one of the most sensitive relationships Australia has to distract the media from the political agenda.
Julie Bishop's clumsiness helped the government. She was mistaken to stress it's not proven whether the Israelis did the operation and she was mistaken to answer yes to the idea that Australia also forges passports, even though I have reported this on two occasions in The Australian and Smith would not deny it at his press conference.
Some context is important. Australian intelligence agents, but also police and others associated with combating drug smuggling and the like, often travel on false Australian passports, that is, passports that do not carry their true identities. That is almost routine.
Much more rare, but not entirely unheard of, is using the passport of another nation. However, it's easy to construct a scenario where this might happen. Say, hypothetically, Canberra wanted to send an ASIS agent of Pakistani origin to Pakistan for an operation and didn't want any indication of an Australian presence. Such an agent might use a Pakistani passport. It's unlikely Australia would forge the passport itself as this is difficult and resource intensive. Instead it would probably borrow such a passport from the British, known to be master forgers, or the Americans.
The government's outrage against Bishop was entirely confected. The government also suggested the Israelis had broken a specific agreement with Australia over passports. This is almost certainly untrue. The Israelis don't acknowledge their passport forgeries and to promise not to do it again can only be predicated on them having done it in the first place. No Howard government minister has any recollection of any such agreement.
The Israelis operate in a unique environment. They have to undertake operations in the Middle East. But use of an Israeli passport in most Middle East countries is impossible. So they are forced to use other passports.
Israel is incredibly beleaguered at the moment. It has never been under such sustained political attack.
In many parts of the world, anti-Israel sentiment is morphing into traditional anti-Semitism. By making such a cynical and exuberant public relations bonanza out of this episode, the Rudd government is directly licensing the recrudescence of the worst sentiments imaginable. I can't conceive that this would have been Dietrich Bonhoeffer's way.
The government dismayed many of its own supporters, who took its previous rhetoric about friendship with Israel seriously. Michael Danby is the Labor member for the critical Melbourne seat of Melbourne Ports.
He is in no sense a marginal figure in Labor. He is a former secretary of Labor's national security committee, a former Labor whip, and the chairman of the parliamentary foreign affairs sub-committee, that is the most senior parliamentarian, outside the ministry, on foreign affairs.
Yesterday, he said: "The expulsion was the wrong policy response. Even if there was some obscure previous incident, Berlin and Paris are as sophisticated as the mandarins of Canberra and their reaction (no expulsion) demonstrates why we did not have to ape the British Foreign Office. Stephen Smith should have made a recommendation to the NSC having the more worldly overview, that this harsh proscription would feed the international campaign of delegitimation of Israel.
This harsh reaction by Australia comes just at a time when we want the Israelis to be as flexible as possible in the new peace talks with the Arabs.
This folly, this over reaction, has unwittingly encouraged bigots elsewhere, who have their secret passions sanctioned. I have suggested a series of steps to the Prime Minister to overcome this successful attempt to blot Labor's copybook just weeks before an election."
That's what the government's friends think of it.
The Australian
THE Earth moved between Israel and Australia this week, with Kevin Rudd's government expelling an Israeli diplomat over the Dubai passports affair, and it may be that the Earth moved in Australian politics as well.
In an interview with me, Opposition leader Tony Abbott has condemned the expulsion.
"It was an over reaction," Abbott says.
"Sure Britain has done this but other nations whose passports were misused have not.
"I think we need to understand that Israel lives in a far more dangerous world than the rest of us. Sincere friendship means an honest understanding of the dangers they face.
"I don't condone the misuse of Australian passports. The big difference between Israel and almost every other country is that Israel is under existential threat."
There is now a greater difference between the main parties over Israel than at any time since Gough Whitlam.
The Abbott-led Liberal Party is now much more deeply committed to the Israel relationship than the Rudd-led Labor Party.
Rudd's policy towards Israel mirrors his policy towards an Emissions Trading Scheme - an extravagant and emotional level of promise, followed by a complete failure of delivery, marred by short-term political expediency.
This is a tough judgment, but it is the only one that fits the facts.
The Hamas terrorist leader Mahmoud al-Mabhouh was assassinated in Dubai earlier this year, almost certainly by Mossad agents. They used Australian, British, French and Irish passports.
First to the morality of the operation. Mabhouh was a leader of Hamas, which is pledged to Israel's violent destruction. He had much innocent blood on his hands. His assassination is morally exactly the same as when an Australian SAS unit targets an al-Qa'ida leader for attack in Afghanistan, as the SAS has often done.
It is an even closer parallel to US drones hitting a terrorist in a border area of Pakistan.
US President Barack Obama has decided, with Australian support, that merely fleeing the conflict zone of Afghanistan to the haven of Pakistan will not prevent an al-Qa'ida or Taliban terrorist being killed by US forces. So any Canberra moral outrage at the Israeli operation, which Foreign Minister Stephen Smith describes without qualification, or sophistication, as murder, is hypocritical and confected.
Objecting to the misuse of Australian passports is entirely reasonable. But the manner in which the Rudd government has effected the expulsion demonstrates cynicism and short-term political opportunism.
When the passport misuse was first revealed in February, the Rudd government made a great song and dance about it. Emotions ran high. The government in effect sooled the Australian media on to savage Israel. It made sure there were cameras outside the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade when the Israeli ambassador, Yuval Rotem, was summoned for a ritual dressing down.
For six weeks, the Israelis were cast into diplomatic outer darkness. There was no dialogue of substance between Canberra and Jerusalem. Then suddenly there was a thaw.
As part of its initial response the government sent a delegation of Australian Federal Police to Israel. This was all show - and a pretty poor show given their well-publicised problems with Israeli traffic - as the AFP could tell the government nothing more than it already knew. The Israelis did the operation but there is no proof.
The long delay of three months with nothing happening, and the deliberate resumption of diplomatic dialogue, led the Israelis, and Israel's friends in Australia, to believe the government was going low key. Then, all of a sudden, some internal dynamic changed and a couple of weeks ago, the government sent ASIO director David Irvine to Israel.
Irvine is an official of the highest possible quality. But his trip, and the fact that Smith this week publicised it, represents an overt politicisation of ASIO by the government. The Irvine trip, which could produce nothing more than the AFP trip, gave the government cover for the expulsion. The manner and timing of the expulsion reflect very poorly on Rudd.
The government decided to announce the expulsion on Monday, the first day of parliament's new sitting. This was the day it was likely to face its heaviest pasting over the resource super-profits tax, just as the earlier outburst of confected anger against Israel coincided with a spike in the pink batts controversy.
This is a government obsessed with the management of the daily media cycle. The Opposition's foreign affairs spokeswoman, Julie Bishop, instinctively supported Israel but did so incompetently and gave the government more opportunity for confected outrage. But it is very low-grade behaviour to ruin a key relationship such as that with Israel for domestic political advantage.
Smith claimed that he was taking the action to expel an Israeli more in sorrow than in anger.
But Smith made his statement in parliament to get the greatest possible media. Although the government had all the information it needed for any action for months, there was a sense of rush at the last minute. Bishop was rung at 11.30am and abruptly told senior officials were on their way to her office to brief her. The officials were in her office while Smith was making his noon statement.
The Israeli embassy was not told of the impending expulsion until 11am.
This is a great contrast to the British behaviour. When the British expulsion was announced, the Israeli diplomat was already back home. If you are doing something to an old friend, more in sorrow than in anger, surely you tell the old friend first.
Similarly, it is a great breach of normal practice for a friendly country to publicise the visit of an agency head, such as Irvine. The fact the government publicised the visit is a politicisation of ASIO. It is the government using a national security smokescreen to cover what is entirely a political decision.
Smith also let it be known that the Israeli to be expelled was the Mossad chief in Canberra. In 2006, under the Howard government, Australia and Israel decided to station senior intelligence people in each others' countries. There was a Mossad officer among the Israeli diplomats in Canberra and an ASIO person in the Australian embassy in Tel Aviv. These are declared positions of friendly agencies. They don't spy on each other, but work together.
Australia and Israel for many years have had close intelligence exchanges. The chiefs of our other intelligence agencies also visit Israel, but quietly, and gain an enormous amount of information and insight from every visit. We also send senior national security personnel from across a number of agencies for short courses.
Smith said intelligence co-operation between Canberra and Jerusalem would now cool for an indefinite period. This will be entirely to our detriment. Despite the recent difficulties, not least its agents being filmed in Dubai, kilo for kilo, the Mossad is without question the best intelligence agency in the world.
Australia has significant interests in Iraq, is acutely concerned with Iran, and will, according to our own Counter-Terrorism White Paper, quite likely be a target of Hezbollah terrorism. On all these subjects no country is better informed than Israel. At this stage, Israel has not asked the ASIO representative to go home. Nor is it clear how long the ban on a Mossad agent coming to Canberra will be enforced. Equally, it is not clear Israel will bother sending a Mossad officer to Australia.
This whole sequence has the hallmarks not of an intelligence operation but a Hawker-Britton operation, the Rudd government using one of the most sensitive relationships Australia has to distract the media from the political agenda.
Julie Bishop's clumsiness helped the government. She was mistaken to stress it's not proven whether the Israelis did the operation and she was mistaken to answer yes to the idea that Australia also forges passports, even though I have reported this on two occasions in The Australian and Smith would not deny it at his press conference.
Some context is important. Australian intelligence agents, but also police and others associated with combating drug smuggling and the like, often travel on false Australian passports, that is, passports that do not carry their true identities. That is almost routine.
Much more rare, but not entirely unheard of, is using the passport of another nation. However, it's easy to construct a scenario where this might happen. Say, hypothetically, Canberra wanted to send an ASIS agent of Pakistani origin to Pakistan for an operation and didn't want any indication of an Australian presence. Such an agent might use a Pakistani passport. It's unlikely Australia would forge the passport itself as this is difficult and resource intensive. Instead it would probably borrow such a passport from the British, known to be master forgers, or the Americans.
The government's outrage against Bishop was entirely confected. The government also suggested the Israelis had broken a specific agreement with Australia over passports. This is almost certainly untrue. The Israelis don't acknowledge their passport forgeries and to promise not to do it again can only be predicated on them having done it in the first place. No Howard government minister has any recollection of any such agreement.
The Israelis operate in a unique environment. They have to undertake operations in the Middle East. But use of an Israeli passport in most Middle East countries is impossible. So they are forced to use other passports.
Israel is incredibly beleaguered at the moment. It has never been under such sustained political attack.
In many parts of the world, anti-Israel sentiment is morphing into traditional anti-Semitism. By making such a cynical and exuberant public relations bonanza out of this episode, the Rudd government is directly licensing the recrudescence of the worst sentiments imaginable. I can't conceive that this would have been Dietrich Bonhoeffer's way.
The government dismayed many of its own supporters, who took its previous rhetoric about friendship with Israel seriously. Michael Danby is the Labor member for the critical Melbourne seat of Melbourne Ports.
He is in no sense a marginal figure in Labor. He is a former secretary of Labor's national security committee, a former Labor whip, and the chairman of the parliamentary foreign affairs sub-committee, that is the most senior parliamentarian, outside the ministry, on foreign affairs.
Yesterday, he said: "The expulsion was the wrong policy response. Even if there was some obscure previous incident, Berlin and Paris are as sophisticated as the mandarins of Canberra and their reaction (no expulsion) demonstrates why we did not have to ape the British Foreign Office. Stephen Smith should have made a recommendation to the NSC having the more worldly overview, that this harsh proscription would feed the international campaign of delegitimation of Israel.
This harsh reaction by Australia comes just at a time when we want the Israelis to be as flexible as possible in the new peace talks with the Arabs.
This folly, this over reaction, has unwittingly encouraged bigots elsewhere, who have their secret passions sanctioned. I have suggested a series of steps to the Prime Minister to overcome this successful attempt to blot Labor's copybook just weeks before an election."
That's what the government's friends think of it.
The Australian
Thursday, 27 May 2010
Australia part of fake passport swapping club
as posted here ... Australia part of fake passport swapping club
AUSTRALIAN security agencies use false passports issued by the Department of Foreign Affairs to allow covert operatives to function overseas, intelligence sources have admitted.
Following the admission by the Deputy Opposition Leader, Julie Bishop, about Australian use of fake passports, sources confirmed Australia has a long-standing tradition of providing passports to overseas intelligence agencies. These countries are within the ''Western intelligence club'' - specifically Britain, the United States, New Zealand and Canada, sources confirm.
While the government has leapt upon Ms Bishop's comments, accusing her of a grievous breach of national security, sources within the intelligence community have confirmed she merely made public an inconvenient truth.
Security agencies, including the international spy agency, the Australian Secret Intelligence Service, as well as ASIO and the federal police, use false passports issued by the Department of Foreign Affairs to allow covert operatives to function overseas.
Australia does not use the identities of its citizens or forge existing passports. Rather, it creates a passport of a fictitious person and provides it to an intelligence operative.
It is a practice similar to that used by state police when they create fake identities for undercover police officers.
In the grey world of espionage the necessity for covert activity can be great, and from time to time - in Australia perhaps as seldom as once a year - the Department of Foreign Affairs will create a passport at the request of an agency. The only caveat is that the intelligence service keep Foreign Affairs informed of the movement of the agent through national borders.
The Australian government would also be extremely judicious in its use of such passports, particularly so when providing them to other countries.
There is a big difference between creating fake passports and using real passports, as in the Mossad assassination of arms dealer Mahmoud al-Mabhouh that led Australia to expel an Israeli diplomat this week.
What Israel did was to forge the passports of actual foreign nationals - including four Australians - to use for their agents.
Ms Bishop - a cabinet minister in the Howard government - was pounced upon by Labor after her comments to the Herald on Tuesday. ''It wasn't what you would call kosher,'' one intelligence source said.
Do you know more? contact@smh.com.au
AUSTRALIAN security agencies use false passports issued by the Department of Foreign Affairs to allow covert operatives to function overseas, intelligence sources have admitted.
Following the admission by the Deputy Opposition Leader, Julie Bishop, about Australian use of fake passports, sources confirmed Australia has a long-standing tradition of providing passports to overseas intelligence agencies. These countries are within the ''Western intelligence club'' - specifically Britain, the United States, New Zealand and Canada, sources confirm.
While the government has leapt upon Ms Bishop's comments, accusing her of a grievous breach of national security, sources within the intelligence community have confirmed she merely made public an inconvenient truth.
Security agencies, including the international spy agency, the Australian Secret Intelligence Service, as well as ASIO and the federal police, use false passports issued by the Department of Foreign Affairs to allow covert operatives to function overseas.
Australia does not use the identities of its citizens or forge existing passports. Rather, it creates a passport of a fictitious person and provides it to an intelligence operative.
It is a practice similar to that used by state police when they create fake identities for undercover police officers.
In the grey world of espionage the necessity for covert activity can be great, and from time to time - in Australia perhaps as seldom as once a year - the Department of Foreign Affairs will create a passport at the request of an agency. The only caveat is that the intelligence service keep Foreign Affairs informed of the movement of the agent through national borders.
The Australian government would also be extremely judicious in its use of such passports, particularly so when providing them to other countries.
There is a big difference between creating fake passports and using real passports, as in the Mossad assassination of arms dealer Mahmoud al-Mabhouh that led Australia to expel an Israeli diplomat this week.
What Israel did was to forge the passports of actual foreign nationals - including four Australians - to use for their agents.
Ms Bishop - a cabinet minister in the Howard government - was pounced upon by Labor after her comments to the Herald on Tuesday. ''It wasn't what you would call kosher,'' one intelligence source said.
Do you know more? contact@smh.com.au
Bishop to continue security briefs - National News - National - General - The Canberra Times
as posted here ... Bishop to continue security briefs - National News - National - General - The Canberra Times
The Federal Government will continue to brief the Opposition on sensitive national security issues despite its claims that Opposition foreign affairs spokeswoman Julie Bishop is unfit to handle such matters.
A spokeswoman for Foreign Affairs Minister Stephen Smith confirmed last night that it was ''not proposed to disturb current arrangements which are of long standing.''
The Government stepped up its attacks yesterday on Ms Bishop for suggesting in media interviews on Tuesday that Australian intelligence agencies used forged foreign passports.
Ms Bishop made her comments after a classified briefing by Australian intelligence, security and police agencies on the Israeli Government's use of forged Australian passports in connection with the assassination of a senior Hamas commander in Dubai.
In Parliament Mr Smith charged that Ms Bishop had breached longstanding conventions concerning the confidentiality of security and intelligence briefings and a ''fundamental principle'' of not commenting or speculating on national security and intelligence matters.
''She is not a fit and proper person to sit around the National Security Committee of the cabinet,'' he said.
''She is not a fit and proper person to discharge that role.''
Mr Smith called on Opposition Leader Tony Abbott to acknowledge Ms Bishop's conduct was ''unacceptable, that she was in serious breach of a fundamental principle and, as a consequence, she has put our national security interests at risk''.
However, despite the Government's claims, national security sources said there was no intention to terminate or restrict briefings for the Opposition on national security issues. There is a statutory obligation for the Directors-General of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation and the Australian Secret Intelligence Service to brief the Opposition Leader on the activities of their agencies.
By convention, the shadow ministers for foreign affairs and defence, and the shadow attorney-general are also briefed on classified matters including ASIO, ASIS and the top-secret Pine Gap Joint Defence Facility.
The Federal Government will continue to brief the Opposition on sensitive national security issues despite its claims that Opposition foreign affairs spokeswoman Julie Bishop is unfit to handle such matters.
A spokeswoman for Foreign Affairs Minister Stephen Smith confirmed last night that it was ''not proposed to disturb current arrangements which are of long standing.''
The Government stepped up its attacks yesterday on Ms Bishop for suggesting in media interviews on Tuesday that Australian intelligence agencies used forged foreign passports.
Ms Bishop made her comments after a classified briefing by Australian intelligence, security and police agencies on the Israeli Government's use of forged Australian passports in connection with the assassination of a senior Hamas commander in Dubai.
In Parliament Mr Smith charged that Ms Bishop had breached longstanding conventions concerning the confidentiality of security and intelligence briefings and a ''fundamental principle'' of not commenting or speculating on national security and intelligence matters.
''She is not a fit and proper person to sit around the National Security Committee of the cabinet,'' he said.
''She is not a fit and proper person to discharge that role.''
Mr Smith called on Opposition Leader Tony Abbott to acknowledge Ms Bishop's conduct was ''unacceptable, that she was in serious breach of a fundamental principle and, as a consequence, she has put our national security interests at risk''.
However, despite the Government's claims, national security sources said there was no intention to terminate or restrict briefings for the Opposition on national security issues. There is a statutory obligation for the Directors-General of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation and the Australian Secret Intelligence Service to brief the Opposition Leader on the activities of their agencies.
By convention, the shadow ministers for foreign affairs and defence, and the shadow attorney-general are also briefed on classified matters including ASIO, ASIS and the top-secret Pine Gap Joint Defence Facility.
Wednesday, 26 May 2010
Australia - Foreign Minister Smith interview with Jon Faine, ABC Melbourne
as posted here ... Australia - Foreign Minister Smith interview with Jon Faine, ABC Melbourne
Topics: Expulsion of Israeli diplomat, abuse of Australian passports, Foreign Aid budget
JON FAINE: Stephen Smith is the Minister for Foreign Affairs in Kevin Rudd's Government and joins us from the national capital, as he announced yesterday that Australia was expelling one Israeli envoy from their embassy in the national capital because of events back in January.
Stephen Smith, good morning.
STEPHEN SMITH: Good morning, Jon.
JON FAINE: Why has it taken so long?
STEPHEN SMITH: Because we wanted to give this matter exhaustive consideration. I commissioned, through the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, an investigation by the Australian Federal Police in February. I received that report in April. It was clear from that report that further work needed to be done by other security agencies, in particular ASIO.
That included a visit to Israel by the Director-General of ASIO, and I received a final report and final advices on all of these matters last week.
I wanted to brief the National Security Committee of the Cabinet, which I did yesterday. But I also wanted to advise the Parliament, in the first instance, of the decision that we had made because of the importance of the decision to our national security interests and to the integrity of our passport system.
JON FAINE: Who chose the individual who's being expelled? Did Australia identify someone, or did the Israelis 'fess up?
STEPHEN SMITH: Well the Secretary of the Department, at my request, spoke to the Chargé yesterday in the absence of the Israeli Ambassador, and indicated we wanted an Israeli official from the embassy to depart. We indicated…
JON FAINE: Yes, but any official, or did you say who it was?
STEPHEN SMITH: We indicated privately whom that official should be, but we don't propose to identify that official in any way and that is…
JON FAINE: Why not?
STEPHEN SMITH: That's in accordance with all of the usual customs in these matters; we simply indicate that we want an official to leave and that's what is occurring.
JON FAINE: Is that person a spy, a Mossad spy?
STEPHEN SMITH: I'm not proposing, as I said yesterday, to categorise, characterise or identify that individual. People can speculate, people can draw their own conclusions if they want to…
JON FAINE: Would I be wrong if I speculated that this person is a Mossad agent working in Canberra?
STEPHEN SMITH: Well, you would simply be speculating. It's a matter for you to do that; I'm not proposing to be drawn on it.
JON FAINE: Well why else would you be asking that that individual, nominated individual, be required to leave?
STEPHEN SMITH: In accordance with all of these usual diplomatic processes, we indicate to the relevant embassy that we want and require an official to leave. That's what we've done.
JON FAINE: When did you first know that there was a Mossad spy working in Canberra?
STEPHEN SMITH: I'm not proposing, Jon, to go into any of these details. That is not the way in which we administer or deliberate over these matters. As I said yesterday to the press conference, I'd made a statement to the Parliament. There was a limit to what I could add to that, for all of the obvious national security interest reasons.
JON FAINE: Are you treating Israel differently to the way you'd treat some other country if the same situation arose in relation to one of their so-called diplomats working as a spy and intruding on the Australian sovereignty?
STEPHEN SMITH: We have treated this matter, Jon, in accordance with the way in which any Australian Government that is assiduous about protecting our national security interests would treat it.
JON FAINE: No, we've gone softly-softly, slowly-slowly and then, without wanting to upset or offend Israel, but please, you're going to have to get rid of somebody.
STEPHEN SMITH: We have asked the Australian Federal Police to conduct an investigation, and we have very carefully considered the combined advice to us of our national security agencies: the Australian Federal Police, ASIO, ASIS, and the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. And we have made a decision, which we believe is sensible and appropriate in the circumstances.
It sends a very strong message that we will not stand idly by and allow our passport system to be trampled over; we will not stand idly by and allow our sovereignty to be trampled upon; we will not stand idly by and see our national security interest trampled, which is what Mr Abbot and Ms Bishop are saying in response to our decision.
JON FAINE: But we won't get very angry and we won't act quickly and we won't act decisively either because we don't want to offend and upset the Israelis. It's a very half-hearted response, if you don't mind me saying so, Minister.
STEPHEN SMITH: You're perfectly entitled to say what you like, Jon, but you won't be surprised that I fundamentally disagree with your flawed analysis.
In national security interests, you do not want to rush to judgement as Mr Abbott did. Before the Australia Federal Police have even completed their inquiry, Mr Abbott said we should do nothing. So you don't want to rush to judgement; that's the first point.
Secondly, you want to do it after you have carefully considered all of the appropriate and relevant advice, and this is the mistake, a very serious mistake, that Ms Bishop has made. She received briefings yesterday from the Australian Federal Police, ASIO, ASIS, and the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, making the same points to her as was made to me, which I accurately reflected in the Parliament.
She has shown that she is not fit to be responsible for our national security interests. These are not matters where you either rush to judgment or where you flagrantly ignore the very serious advice that you receive from our national security agencies.
We have given this difficult decision very careful consideration and we believe that it is an appropriate response to reflect our very strong view that our passport system should not be trampled over, that our sovereignty should not be trampled over, and our national security interests should not be trampled over.
JON FAINE: Minister, I've had a quick look at some of the Israeli newspapers online this morning in their online editions. If they mention this at all, mention it as a two line item in brief, in passing. It just doesn't matter to Israel. So what sort of a signal do you really think is being sent to the Government of Israel?
STEPHEN SMITH: Well I haven't checked the Israeli media myself, Jon…
JON FAINE: But I'm telling you I have. It barely rates a mention.
STEPHEN SMITH: Well I'm very happy for you to do that, Jon. I'm very happy for you to scour whatever websites you want to. But the Israeli Government, the Israeli nation, very clearly understands that Australia very strongly believes that their conduct in this matter is not the conduct of a friend, is not the action that we would come to expect from a nation that Australia has been very close to and very supportive of for a long period of time, over a long period of time by successive Australian governments.
That we regard ourselves as having been very badly let down and we will not, unlike Mr Abbott and Ms Bishop, turn a blind eye to the trampling of the integrity of our passport system. They got that message very clearly.
JON FAINE: And just finally, Minister, are you concerned about the disclosures at Senate Estimates and in the media about wasted money in Australia's foreign aid contracts, millions of dollars being spent on — well, USD 12 million, for instance, in Papua New Guinea on rent alone, and concerns expressed by all sorts of experts that we're not getting much bang for our buck for the foreign aid money?
STEPHEN SMITH: Well, two things. Firstly, in our Budget we indicated we were doing a review of the level of technical assistance and advisors. That amount, or proportion of our spending, has come down in recent years, firstly.
Secondly, so far as Papua New Guinea is concerned, where some of the focus has been, yesterday I indicated that as a result of a review of the Cooperation Treaty that we have with Papua New Guinea. I published a review yesterday. That clearly points to areas where we need to improve, and we'll do that. We're also very conscious of making sure…
JON FAINE: Sure, but advisor on gender integration earning more than the Prime Minister; five companies sharing a billion dollars or more in AusAID contracts. It doesn't sound very good.
STEPHEN SMITH: Which is why we're doing a review of the technical assistance and the advisor arrangements. Jon, in any development assistance program you can, in isolation, draw attention to something which we wouldn't regard as value for money.
What we're trying to do here is to make sure that we discharge our obligations as a good international citizen at the same time that we get value for money. We're very pleased, for example, that the Auditor-General will now look at AusAID programs every year.
We're very pleased that the aid effectiveness program now reports to the Parliament every year. There is more we can do to ensure we get value for money and we deliver aid effectively.
But let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater because we will always find in difficult countries, in developing countries and a very hard environment, examples that you could hold up in isolation and say this was a waste of money.
I acknowledge that and I accept that, but this is a good thing for Australia to do. It's in our national interest to help the countries around us who don't have the same wealth or prosperity that we do. It's a good thing to do and it advances our national interests at the same time.
JON FAINE: All right, I'm grateful to you or your time this morning and thank you. Stephen Smith, Minister for Foreign Affairs.
Topics: Expulsion of Israeli diplomat, abuse of Australian passports, Foreign Aid budget
JON FAINE: Stephen Smith is the Minister for Foreign Affairs in Kevin Rudd's Government and joins us from the national capital, as he announced yesterday that Australia was expelling one Israeli envoy from their embassy in the national capital because of events back in January.
Stephen Smith, good morning.
STEPHEN SMITH: Good morning, Jon.
JON FAINE: Why has it taken so long?
STEPHEN SMITH: Because we wanted to give this matter exhaustive consideration. I commissioned, through the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, an investigation by the Australian Federal Police in February. I received that report in April. It was clear from that report that further work needed to be done by other security agencies, in particular ASIO.
That included a visit to Israel by the Director-General of ASIO, and I received a final report and final advices on all of these matters last week.
I wanted to brief the National Security Committee of the Cabinet, which I did yesterday. But I also wanted to advise the Parliament, in the first instance, of the decision that we had made because of the importance of the decision to our national security interests and to the integrity of our passport system.
JON FAINE: Who chose the individual who's being expelled? Did Australia identify someone, or did the Israelis 'fess up?
STEPHEN SMITH: Well the Secretary of the Department, at my request, spoke to the Chargé yesterday in the absence of the Israeli Ambassador, and indicated we wanted an Israeli official from the embassy to depart. We indicated…
JON FAINE: Yes, but any official, or did you say who it was?
STEPHEN SMITH: We indicated privately whom that official should be, but we don't propose to identify that official in any way and that is…
JON FAINE: Why not?
STEPHEN SMITH: That's in accordance with all of the usual customs in these matters; we simply indicate that we want an official to leave and that's what is occurring.
JON FAINE: Is that person a spy, a Mossad spy?
STEPHEN SMITH: I'm not proposing, as I said yesterday, to categorise, characterise or identify that individual. People can speculate, people can draw their own conclusions if they want to…
JON FAINE: Would I be wrong if I speculated that this person is a Mossad agent working in Canberra?
STEPHEN SMITH: Well, you would simply be speculating. It's a matter for you to do that; I'm not proposing to be drawn on it.
JON FAINE: Well why else would you be asking that that individual, nominated individual, be required to leave?
STEPHEN SMITH: In accordance with all of these usual diplomatic processes, we indicate to the relevant embassy that we want and require an official to leave. That's what we've done.
JON FAINE: When did you first know that there was a Mossad spy working in Canberra?
STEPHEN SMITH: I'm not proposing, Jon, to go into any of these details. That is not the way in which we administer or deliberate over these matters. As I said yesterday to the press conference, I'd made a statement to the Parliament. There was a limit to what I could add to that, for all of the obvious national security interest reasons.
JON FAINE: Are you treating Israel differently to the way you'd treat some other country if the same situation arose in relation to one of their so-called diplomats working as a spy and intruding on the Australian sovereignty?
STEPHEN SMITH: We have treated this matter, Jon, in accordance with the way in which any Australian Government that is assiduous about protecting our national security interests would treat it.
JON FAINE: No, we've gone softly-softly, slowly-slowly and then, without wanting to upset or offend Israel, but please, you're going to have to get rid of somebody.
STEPHEN SMITH: We have asked the Australian Federal Police to conduct an investigation, and we have very carefully considered the combined advice to us of our national security agencies: the Australian Federal Police, ASIO, ASIS, and the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. And we have made a decision, which we believe is sensible and appropriate in the circumstances.
It sends a very strong message that we will not stand idly by and allow our passport system to be trampled over; we will not stand idly by and allow our sovereignty to be trampled upon; we will not stand idly by and see our national security interest trampled, which is what Mr Abbot and Ms Bishop are saying in response to our decision.
JON FAINE: But we won't get very angry and we won't act quickly and we won't act decisively either because we don't want to offend and upset the Israelis. It's a very half-hearted response, if you don't mind me saying so, Minister.
STEPHEN SMITH: You're perfectly entitled to say what you like, Jon, but you won't be surprised that I fundamentally disagree with your flawed analysis.
In national security interests, you do not want to rush to judgement as Mr Abbott did. Before the Australia Federal Police have even completed their inquiry, Mr Abbott said we should do nothing. So you don't want to rush to judgement; that's the first point.
Secondly, you want to do it after you have carefully considered all of the appropriate and relevant advice, and this is the mistake, a very serious mistake, that Ms Bishop has made. She received briefings yesterday from the Australian Federal Police, ASIO, ASIS, and the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, making the same points to her as was made to me, which I accurately reflected in the Parliament.
She has shown that she is not fit to be responsible for our national security interests. These are not matters where you either rush to judgment or where you flagrantly ignore the very serious advice that you receive from our national security agencies.
We have given this difficult decision very careful consideration and we believe that it is an appropriate response to reflect our very strong view that our passport system should not be trampled over, that our sovereignty should not be trampled over, and our national security interests should not be trampled over.
JON FAINE: Minister, I've had a quick look at some of the Israeli newspapers online this morning in their online editions. If they mention this at all, mention it as a two line item in brief, in passing. It just doesn't matter to Israel. So what sort of a signal do you really think is being sent to the Government of Israel?
STEPHEN SMITH: Well I haven't checked the Israeli media myself, Jon…
JON FAINE: But I'm telling you I have. It barely rates a mention.
STEPHEN SMITH: Well I'm very happy for you to do that, Jon. I'm very happy for you to scour whatever websites you want to. But the Israeli Government, the Israeli nation, very clearly understands that Australia very strongly believes that their conduct in this matter is not the conduct of a friend, is not the action that we would come to expect from a nation that Australia has been very close to and very supportive of for a long period of time, over a long period of time by successive Australian governments.
That we regard ourselves as having been very badly let down and we will not, unlike Mr Abbott and Ms Bishop, turn a blind eye to the trampling of the integrity of our passport system. They got that message very clearly.
JON FAINE: And just finally, Minister, are you concerned about the disclosures at Senate Estimates and in the media about wasted money in Australia's foreign aid contracts, millions of dollars being spent on — well, USD 12 million, for instance, in Papua New Guinea on rent alone, and concerns expressed by all sorts of experts that we're not getting much bang for our buck for the foreign aid money?
STEPHEN SMITH: Well, two things. Firstly, in our Budget we indicated we were doing a review of the level of technical assistance and advisors. That amount, or proportion of our spending, has come down in recent years, firstly.
Secondly, so far as Papua New Guinea is concerned, where some of the focus has been, yesterday I indicated that as a result of a review of the Cooperation Treaty that we have with Papua New Guinea. I published a review yesterday. That clearly points to areas where we need to improve, and we'll do that. We're also very conscious of making sure…
JON FAINE: Sure, but advisor on gender integration earning more than the Prime Minister; five companies sharing a billion dollars or more in AusAID contracts. It doesn't sound very good.
STEPHEN SMITH: Which is why we're doing a review of the technical assistance and the advisor arrangements. Jon, in any development assistance program you can, in isolation, draw attention to something which we wouldn't regard as value for money.
What we're trying to do here is to make sure that we discharge our obligations as a good international citizen at the same time that we get value for money. We're very pleased, for example, that the Auditor-General will now look at AusAID programs every year.
We're very pleased that the aid effectiveness program now reports to the Parliament every year. There is more we can do to ensure we get value for money and we deliver aid effectively.
But let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater because we will always find in difficult countries, in developing countries and a very hard environment, examples that you could hold up in isolation and say this was a waste of money.
I acknowledge that and I accept that, but this is a good thing for Australia to do. It's in our national interest to help the countries around us who don't have the same wealth or prosperity that we do. It's a good thing to do and it advances our national interests at the same time.
JON FAINE: All right, I'm grateful to you or your time this morning and thank you. Stephen Smith, Minister for Foreign Affairs.
In spy games, fury has no coin | The Australian
AS POSTED HERE ... In spy games, fury has no coin | The Australian
THE Rudd government's expulsion of the Israeli embassy's resident Mossad agent has been greeted with local indignation and muted acceptance in Israel. But in the intelligence world, any fallout from the fake passports affair could be short-lived.
Despite tough talk on Monday that Israel's actions were not those of a friend, Minister for Foreign Affairs Stephen Smith knows all too well that neither country can afford to have sour diplomatic relations. Security analysts and intelligence experts tell The Australian that the ever-cautious Smith can even take some comfort.
After weighing up the diplomatic fallout, Mossad hit teams and their political masters in Jerusalem are unlikely to be using Australian passports when they next decide to liquidate another Hamas terrorist.
The Netanyahu government has decided it will not embark on a running commentary in response to the expulsion but the decision of ambassador Yuval Rotem to cut short his stay in Israel and return to Canberra immediately underscores the fact Jerusalem does have concerns.
RELATED COVERAGE
Bishop attacked on spy claims
The Australian, 9 hours ago
Australia has forged passports: Bishop
The Australian, 15 hours ago
Passport to a major diplomatic breach
Adelaide Now, 1 day ago
Israel 'faked Aussie passports'
Adelaide Now, 1 day ago
Mossad's man in Canberra has to go
The Australian, 1 day ago
It was a theme reinforced by Yossi Melman, the widely respected intelligence and military affairs correspondent for Israeli newspaper Haaretz, who says while the misuse of Australian passports has caused diplomatic problems between Australia and the Jewish state, damage on the intelligence front will likely be limited.
"You know in these kinds of spy games and in this kind of shadow world, not everything that we see on the surface is the reality underneath," Melman says.
"I know that the Australian government, and rightly so, is very unhappy about using Australian passports, but on the other hand I'm sure that between intelligence organisations there is a greater understanding that such operations are a necessity from time to time," Melman told ABC's Lateline on Monday.
This curious spat has its origins five months ago. But it has been exacerbated by Australian claims of an alleged breach of a confidential undertaking given years earlier.
It began on January 20 with the discovery of the body of a leading Palestinian militant, Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, in his room at a luxury Dubai hotel.
After some initial confusion over cause of death some smart police work in Dubai determined that the Palestinian militant had been murdered: injected with a muscle relaxant and then suffocated.
Vision obtained from hotel security cameras pointed to the involvement of a team of assassins and the finger of blame was quickly pointed at Israel's spy agency, Mossad. Israel has never denied the charge.
At first it appeared just like any of the other Israeli anti-terrorist assassinations; there have been at least 40 during the past 50 years, according to Melman.
But the Dubai hit became complicated with the discovery al-Mabhouh's killers were travelling on forged British, Irish, Canadian, German and Australian passports. Significantly, no US passports were involved.
When Dubai authorities contacted Canberra asking for information on the details of four Australian passports linked to the murder, alarm bells rang.
The Australian Federal Police was called in, as were the two key national intelligence agencies, the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation and its overseas counterpart, the Australian Secret Intelligence Service. Their findings confirmed what everyone suspected. And while it stopped short of confirming a state-sanctioned hit by Mossad, it did finger Israel for passport misuse.
The potential for prolonged diplomatic damage should not be overstated. While Canberra gains some benefit from intelligence sharing with Israel - mostly involving developments in Lebanon - formal agreements with allies, all of whom maintain links with their Israeli counterparts, mean it is highly unlikely Australia will be cut out of the intelligence loop.
"The major source of Australia's intelligence is through the ABCA [America, Britain, Canada, Australia] countries and anything of critical interest to both countries [Israel and Australia] will be passed on regardless of this affair," an Australian security analyst with extensive Middle East experience says.
"Australia's reliance on Israeli intelligence sourcing is almost negligible and anything of criticality will come through other sources. I don't see this as being a big intelligence problem at all."
Asked how critical any interruption would be on intelligence sharing between Canberra and Tel Aviv, the analyst replied: "Not much. I've worked at the levels where I would see it and there is nothing much of any note.
"We might give them some stuff on JI [Jemaah Islamiyah] but they [Israel] would get it through the Americans, the Brits, the Canadians, even the Singaporeans: they have very close links with Israel."
It all highlights the difficulties for the Rudd government in shaping an appropriate response.
In his ministerial statement on Monday, Smith said no government can tolerate the abuse of
its passports, a clear affront to
the security of the passport system.
"These investigations and advice have left the government in no doubt that Israel was responsible for the abuse and counterfeiting of these passports.
"I note that a similar conclusion was reached by the United Kingdom government in the course of their official investigations," Smith said.
Israel's actions were not the actions of a friend, Smith added.
Australia's bipartisan support for Israel goes back to the creation of the country in 1948.
What rankles with Smith seems not so much the murder of al-Mabhouh, but a breach of a confidential undertaking given to Australia years earlier during the Howard government.
"The Dubai passports incident also constitutes a clear and direct breach of confidential understandings between Australia and Israel dating back some years," he said.
According to former foreign minister Alexander Downer, that involved a promise by Israel its Mossad operatives would not misuse Australian passports after a bungled 2003 attempt to clone Australian and New Zealand identities, an incident more worthy of the Keystone Kops than a crack spy organisation.
In July 2004 New Zealand imposed diplomatic sanctions on Israel over an incident in which two Israeli citizens living in Sydney attempted to fraudulently obtain NZ passports by claiming the identity of a disabled man.
Their attempt to mimic a NZ accent gave them away.
An alert Kiwi immigration official alerted the country's security agency, resulting in arrests and six-month jail terms for both men. Two other agents are believed to have escaped.
In a new twist, The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday one of the Dubai suspects is believed to have been involved in that case.
So far the Israeli response has been muted; Tel Aviv, it seems, does not want to give the matter any oxygen.
Israel's Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor would only say: "We regret the Australian decision, which is not in line with the quality and the importance of our relationship."
Netanyahu has refrained from commenting, with the only minister so far to make any comment being Dan Meridor, Deputy PM and Minister for Intelligence Agencies.
Meridor described the Israeli-Australian relationship as "strong, deep and broad", which would endure the expulsion because it was in the interests of both countries to do so.
But the media has not been so positive. Writing in Haaretz, columnist Amir Oren says it took "a special talent" to damage the relationship between Israel and Australia.
"Lately, there have not been any top-tier Australian politicians who were not supportive of Israel," Oren writes.
"It thus requires special talent to transform Australia into a country that feels obligated to take steps against Israel. Yet one person in Israel has that talent. And this time, it is not Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman.
"The person who managed to get Israel in trouble with Australia, Britain and the other embittered countries is the head of Mossad, Meir Dagan.
"But what does Dagan care about Rudd, Smith or [David] Irvine? So long as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is in his pocket, the world can go to hell.
"And if it does not do so on its own, Dagan will show it how."
Back in Canberra the affair and the government's handling of the it triggered angry claims by deputy opposition leader Julie Bishop that Australian intelligence agencies had previously used forged passports.
Her claims follow confidential security briefings by ASIO and the AFP given prior to Smith's ministerial statement on the Mossad expulsion. It sparked a sharp rebuke from the Foreign Minister. In parliament yesterday, Smith said the remarks show Bishop can not be trusted.
But they also failed to differentiate a key Smith grievance: that the Israeli actions constituted identity theft of innocent Australian citizens rather than forgery.
The Rudd government's response to the Israeli actions has been measured and considered, says Hugh White, head of the Australian National University's Strategic and Defence Studies Centre.
"The fact the Israelis got caught out in such a flagrant misuse of our passports made it impossible for the government not to respond in some way. I think the government's response in this has been entirely reasonable," White says.
"The biggest mystery in this remains the fact the Israelis put themselves in this position by using passports in such a flagrant way. That, and the fact they were prepared to do it all on video, seemed to make the fact it was all going to come unstuck inevitable."
Regardless, the issue has proved fertile ground for the opposition after the powerful Jewish lobby expressed disappointment at the government's decision to expel the embassy's Mossad agent.
Earlier, Bishop accused Rudd of exploiting the affair to curry favour with Arab governments in order to enhance prospects of a UN Security Council seat,
claims the government strongly rejected.
At a press conference, Smith declined to answer whether Australian national intelligence agencies use forged passports.
" I can say with my hand well and truly firmly clasped on my heart that when it comes to intelligence matters, when it comes to operational matters, consistent with the long-standing tradition of all Australian governments, I'm never drawn on our intelligence community or the intelligence agency for which I have formal ministerial responsibility, ASIS."
While he expects a temporary "cooling off" in intelligence co-operation with Israel, Canberra's Middle East diplomacy remains unchanged.
Asked if the issue would change attitudes towards Israel at the UN, Smith said: "Absolutely not. And I have to say that since the announcement of the AFP investigation until now there have been a couple of matters with respect to Israel, either before the General Assembly or in respect of Middle East peace talks, which people have tried to look through this prism in terms of the Australian government's approach and response.
"Can I just say that we have not allowed this issue to disturb in any way our policy approach to Israel, our policy approach to Middle East peace matters and we will not allow that to occur.
"So far as UN resolutions on the Middle East are concerned, we consider these annually on a case by case basis, within a well understood policy framework about whether the resolutions advance, for example, the furtherance of peace in the Middle East.
"So we have not allowed this matter to disturb the fundamental basis of our approach to the Middle East and nor will we."
Additional reporting: Middle East correspondent John Lyons.
THE Rudd government's expulsion of the Israeli embassy's resident Mossad agent has been greeted with local indignation and muted acceptance in Israel. But in the intelligence world, any fallout from the fake passports affair could be short-lived.
Despite tough talk on Monday that Israel's actions were not those of a friend, Minister for Foreign Affairs Stephen Smith knows all too well that neither country can afford to have sour diplomatic relations. Security analysts and intelligence experts tell The Australian that the ever-cautious Smith can even take some comfort.
After weighing up the diplomatic fallout, Mossad hit teams and their political masters in Jerusalem are unlikely to be using Australian passports when they next decide to liquidate another Hamas terrorist.
The Netanyahu government has decided it will not embark on a running commentary in response to the expulsion but the decision of ambassador Yuval Rotem to cut short his stay in Israel and return to Canberra immediately underscores the fact Jerusalem does have concerns.
RELATED COVERAGE
Bishop attacked on spy claims
The Australian, 9 hours ago
Australia has forged passports: Bishop
The Australian, 15 hours ago
Passport to a major diplomatic breach
Adelaide Now, 1 day ago
Israel 'faked Aussie passports'
Adelaide Now, 1 day ago
Mossad's man in Canberra has to go
The Australian, 1 day ago
It was a theme reinforced by Yossi Melman, the widely respected intelligence and military affairs correspondent for Israeli newspaper Haaretz, who says while the misuse of Australian passports has caused diplomatic problems between Australia and the Jewish state, damage on the intelligence front will likely be limited.
"You know in these kinds of spy games and in this kind of shadow world, not everything that we see on the surface is the reality underneath," Melman says.
"I know that the Australian government, and rightly so, is very unhappy about using Australian passports, but on the other hand I'm sure that between intelligence organisations there is a greater understanding that such operations are a necessity from time to time," Melman told ABC's Lateline on Monday.
This curious spat has its origins five months ago. But it has been exacerbated by Australian claims of an alleged breach of a confidential undertaking given years earlier.
It began on January 20 with the discovery of the body of a leading Palestinian militant, Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, in his room at a luxury Dubai hotel.
After some initial confusion over cause of death some smart police work in Dubai determined that the Palestinian militant had been murdered: injected with a muscle relaxant and then suffocated.
Vision obtained from hotel security cameras pointed to the involvement of a team of assassins and the finger of blame was quickly pointed at Israel's spy agency, Mossad. Israel has never denied the charge.
At first it appeared just like any of the other Israeli anti-terrorist assassinations; there have been at least 40 during the past 50 years, according to Melman.
But the Dubai hit became complicated with the discovery al-Mabhouh's killers were travelling on forged British, Irish, Canadian, German and Australian passports. Significantly, no US passports were involved.
When Dubai authorities contacted Canberra asking for information on the details of four Australian passports linked to the murder, alarm bells rang.
The Australian Federal Police was called in, as were the two key national intelligence agencies, the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation and its overseas counterpart, the Australian Secret Intelligence Service. Their findings confirmed what everyone suspected. And while it stopped short of confirming a state-sanctioned hit by Mossad, it did finger Israel for passport misuse.
The potential for prolonged diplomatic damage should not be overstated. While Canberra gains some benefit from intelligence sharing with Israel - mostly involving developments in Lebanon - formal agreements with allies, all of whom maintain links with their Israeli counterparts, mean it is highly unlikely Australia will be cut out of the intelligence loop.
"The major source of Australia's intelligence is through the ABCA [America, Britain, Canada, Australia] countries and anything of critical interest to both countries [Israel and Australia] will be passed on regardless of this affair," an Australian security analyst with extensive Middle East experience says.
"Australia's reliance on Israeli intelligence sourcing is almost negligible and anything of criticality will come through other sources. I don't see this as being a big intelligence problem at all."
Asked how critical any interruption would be on intelligence sharing between Canberra and Tel Aviv, the analyst replied: "Not much. I've worked at the levels where I would see it and there is nothing much of any note.
"We might give them some stuff on JI [Jemaah Islamiyah] but they [Israel] would get it through the Americans, the Brits, the Canadians, even the Singaporeans: they have very close links with Israel."
It all highlights the difficulties for the Rudd government in shaping an appropriate response.
In his ministerial statement on Monday, Smith said no government can tolerate the abuse of
its passports, a clear affront to
the security of the passport system.
"These investigations and advice have left the government in no doubt that Israel was responsible for the abuse and counterfeiting of these passports.
"I note that a similar conclusion was reached by the United Kingdom government in the course of their official investigations," Smith said.
Israel's actions were not the actions of a friend, Smith added.
Australia's bipartisan support for Israel goes back to the creation of the country in 1948.
What rankles with Smith seems not so much the murder of al-Mabhouh, but a breach of a confidential undertaking given to Australia years earlier during the Howard government.
"The Dubai passports incident also constitutes a clear and direct breach of confidential understandings between Australia and Israel dating back some years," he said.
According to former foreign minister Alexander Downer, that involved a promise by Israel its Mossad operatives would not misuse Australian passports after a bungled 2003 attempt to clone Australian and New Zealand identities, an incident more worthy of the Keystone Kops than a crack spy organisation.
In July 2004 New Zealand imposed diplomatic sanctions on Israel over an incident in which two Israeli citizens living in Sydney attempted to fraudulently obtain NZ passports by claiming the identity of a disabled man.
Their attempt to mimic a NZ accent gave them away.
An alert Kiwi immigration official alerted the country's security agency, resulting in arrests and six-month jail terms for both men. Two other agents are believed to have escaped.
In a new twist, The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday one of the Dubai suspects is believed to have been involved in that case.
So far the Israeli response has been muted; Tel Aviv, it seems, does not want to give the matter any oxygen.
Israel's Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor would only say: "We regret the Australian decision, which is not in line with the quality and the importance of our relationship."
Netanyahu has refrained from commenting, with the only minister so far to make any comment being Dan Meridor, Deputy PM and Minister for Intelligence Agencies.
Meridor described the Israeli-Australian relationship as "strong, deep and broad", which would endure the expulsion because it was in the interests of both countries to do so.
But the media has not been so positive. Writing in Haaretz, columnist Amir Oren says it took "a special talent" to damage the relationship between Israel and Australia.
"Lately, there have not been any top-tier Australian politicians who were not supportive of Israel," Oren writes.
"It thus requires special talent to transform Australia into a country that feels obligated to take steps against Israel. Yet one person in Israel has that talent. And this time, it is not Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman.
"The person who managed to get Israel in trouble with Australia, Britain and the other embittered countries is the head of Mossad, Meir Dagan.
"But what does Dagan care about Rudd, Smith or [David] Irvine? So long as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is in his pocket, the world can go to hell.
"And if it does not do so on its own, Dagan will show it how."
Back in Canberra the affair and the government's handling of the it triggered angry claims by deputy opposition leader Julie Bishop that Australian intelligence agencies had previously used forged passports.
Her claims follow confidential security briefings by ASIO and the AFP given prior to Smith's ministerial statement on the Mossad expulsion. It sparked a sharp rebuke from the Foreign Minister. In parliament yesterday, Smith said the remarks show Bishop can not be trusted.
But they also failed to differentiate a key Smith grievance: that the Israeli actions constituted identity theft of innocent Australian citizens rather than forgery.
The Rudd government's response to the Israeli actions has been measured and considered, says Hugh White, head of the Australian National University's Strategic and Defence Studies Centre.
"The fact the Israelis got caught out in such a flagrant misuse of our passports made it impossible for the government not to respond in some way. I think the government's response in this has been entirely reasonable," White says.
"The biggest mystery in this remains the fact the Israelis put themselves in this position by using passports in such a flagrant way. That, and the fact they were prepared to do it all on video, seemed to make the fact it was all going to come unstuck inevitable."
Regardless, the issue has proved fertile ground for the opposition after the powerful Jewish lobby expressed disappointment at the government's decision to expel the embassy's Mossad agent.
Earlier, Bishop accused Rudd of exploiting the affair to curry favour with Arab governments in order to enhance prospects of a UN Security Council seat,
claims the government strongly rejected.
At a press conference, Smith declined to answer whether Australian national intelligence agencies use forged passports.
" I can say with my hand well and truly firmly clasped on my heart that when it comes to intelligence matters, when it comes to operational matters, consistent with the long-standing tradition of all Australian governments, I'm never drawn on our intelligence community or the intelligence agency for which I have formal ministerial responsibility, ASIS."
While he expects a temporary "cooling off" in intelligence co-operation with Israel, Canberra's Middle East diplomacy remains unchanged.
Asked if the issue would change attitudes towards Israel at the UN, Smith said: "Absolutely not. And I have to say that since the announcement of the AFP investigation until now there have been a couple of matters with respect to Israel, either before the General Assembly or in respect of Middle East peace talks, which people have tried to look through this prism in terms of the Australian government's approach and response.
"Can I just say that we have not allowed this issue to disturb in any way our policy approach to Israel, our policy approach to Middle East peace matters and we will not allow that to occur.
"So far as UN resolutions on the Middle East are concerned, we consider these annually on a case by case basis, within a well understood policy framework about whether the resolutions advance, for example, the furtherance of peace in the Middle East.
"So we have not allowed this matter to disturb the fundamental basis of our approach to the Middle East and nor will we."
Additional reporting: Middle East correspondent John Lyons.
Tuesday, 25 May 2010
Complaints rocket over slow pace of assessments
as posted here ... Complaints rocket over slow pace of assessments
THE nation's domestic spy agency has received a surge of complaints about the time it is taking to complete security assessments.
The acting Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security, Vivienne Thom, told a Senate estimates hearing last night that it had received 850 complaints about the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation's security assessment process this financial year to April 30.
This is more than five times the 157 complaints it received in the entire 2008-09 financial year and more than four times the 193 it received the previous year.
Dr Thom said all but eight of the complaints received this financial year related to the timeliness of the assessments.
''There has been a large increase,'' she said.
Dr Thom said the rise was not entirely attributable to an increase in asylum seeker arrivals, but said 205 of the complaints were from people being held at the Christmas Island immigration detention centre.
''We believe there's been a substantial increase because of the increase in activity, the increase in the number of assessments they are having to conduct,'' Dr Thom said.
She said her office had investigated a number of the complaints, but had not found any reason to believe that ASIO had acted unreasonably.
THE nation's domestic spy agency has received a surge of complaints about the time it is taking to complete security assessments.
The acting Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security, Vivienne Thom, told a Senate estimates hearing last night that it had received 850 complaints about the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation's security assessment process this financial year to April 30.
This is more than five times the 157 complaints it received in the entire 2008-09 financial year and more than four times the 193 it received the previous year.
Dr Thom said all but eight of the complaints received this financial year related to the timeliness of the assessments.
''There has been a large increase,'' she said.
Dr Thom said the rise was not entirely attributable to an increase in asylum seeker arrivals, but said 205 of the complaints were from people being held at the Christmas Island immigration detention centre.
''We believe there's been a substantial increase because of the increase in activity, the increase in the number of assessments they are having to conduct,'' Dr Thom said.
She said her office had investigated a number of the complaints, but had not found any reason to believe that ASIO had acted unreasonably.
Monday, 24 May 2010
Diplomat expelled to win Arab favour: Bishop - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
AS POSTED HERE ... Diplomat expelled to win Arab favour: Bishop - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
The Federal Opposition has accused the Government of expelling an Israeli diplomat as a means to win Arab support for an Australian seat on the United Nations Security Council.
Foreign Minister Stephen Smith today announced the expulsion after investigations left the Government in "no doubt" Israel had faked Australian passports used in a hit on a top Hamas leader in Dubai.
But Deputy Opposition Leader Julie Bishop says there is no hard proof Israel is behind the duplicated passports.
"In the absence of proof, it would be appropriate to reprimand, appropriate to chastise the Israeli government," she told Sky News.
"There is a widely held view, there is an assumption that the Israeli government was involved, but there is no actual proof."
Ms Bishop, the Opposition foreign affairs spokeswoman, says expelling a diplomat is either an over-reaction or a calculated political decision.
"The Government is facing an election. The Government is also seeking to pursue a seat on the Security Council. The Government is keen to curry favour within the Arab community," she said.
Ms Bishop, however, denied suggestions the Opposition's position would help it shore up support from Australia's Jewish community.
In February several forged Australian passports were used in the assassination of Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Mabhouh.
Mr Smith confirmed investigations by Australian Federal Police, ASIO and ASIS showed Israel fabricated the passports of four Australians who also had Israeli nationality.
He has rejected accusations the decision to expel an Israeli diplomat was politically driven.
Mr Smith says the Government has conducted its own investigation and acted on carefully constructed advice.
"If all we were doing as the Deputy Leader of the Opposition asserts, being political, we wouldn't have taken such time giving it careful consideration," he said.
"The high quality of these counterfeited passports points to involvement of a state intelligence service," he said.
"These investigations and advice have left the Australian Government in no doubt that Israel was responsible for the abuse and counterfeiting of these passports.
"The Government takes this step much more in sorrow than anger or retaliation.
"This is not what we expect from a nation with whom we have had such a close, friendly and supportive relationship."
Regrettable decision
A spokesman for the Israeli foreign ministry, Yigal Palmor, says it is a regrettable decision.
"We regret this step by the Australian Government," he said.
"It does not reflect the importance and the quality of our relationships."
Israel has maintained there is no proof it was behind the assassination.
Meanwhile retired Liberal MP and former foreign minister, Alexander Downer, says it is "pretty obvious" why the Government made the decision to expel the diplomat.
"In an effort to try to beat Finland and Luxembourg, the Australian Government is going out of its way to ingratiate itself to other countries in the Middle East, to build up its credentials with the Gulf Cooperation Council and other Middle Eastern countries," he said.
"So this is a good way of doing it. That's what's driven this. It's not a point of principle.
"Israel is not the only country that engages in this sort of behaviour, frankly, so it's a bit rich to single out Israel."
Nicole McCabe, Joshua Bruce, Adam Korman and Joshua Krycer have been named as the Australians whose passports were forged. All four live in Israel.
Mr Smith says replacement passports have been issued and consular assistance is still being provided to the four Australians.
The Federal Opposition has accused the Government of expelling an Israeli diplomat as a means to win Arab support for an Australian seat on the United Nations Security Council.
Foreign Minister Stephen Smith today announced the expulsion after investigations left the Government in "no doubt" Israel had faked Australian passports used in a hit on a top Hamas leader in Dubai.
But Deputy Opposition Leader Julie Bishop says there is no hard proof Israel is behind the duplicated passports.
"In the absence of proof, it would be appropriate to reprimand, appropriate to chastise the Israeli government," she told Sky News.
"There is a widely held view, there is an assumption that the Israeli government was involved, but there is no actual proof."
Ms Bishop, the Opposition foreign affairs spokeswoman, says expelling a diplomat is either an over-reaction or a calculated political decision.
"The Government is facing an election. The Government is also seeking to pursue a seat on the Security Council. The Government is keen to curry favour within the Arab community," she said.
Ms Bishop, however, denied suggestions the Opposition's position would help it shore up support from Australia's Jewish community.
In February several forged Australian passports were used in the assassination of Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Mabhouh.
Mr Smith confirmed investigations by Australian Federal Police, ASIO and ASIS showed Israel fabricated the passports of four Australians who also had Israeli nationality.
He has rejected accusations the decision to expel an Israeli diplomat was politically driven.
Mr Smith says the Government has conducted its own investigation and acted on carefully constructed advice.
"If all we were doing as the Deputy Leader of the Opposition asserts, being political, we wouldn't have taken such time giving it careful consideration," he said.
"The high quality of these counterfeited passports points to involvement of a state intelligence service," he said.
"These investigations and advice have left the Australian Government in no doubt that Israel was responsible for the abuse and counterfeiting of these passports.
"The Government takes this step much more in sorrow than anger or retaliation.
"This is not what we expect from a nation with whom we have had such a close, friendly and supportive relationship."
Regrettable decision
A spokesman for the Israeli foreign ministry, Yigal Palmor, says it is a regrettable decision.
"We regret this step by the Australian Government," he said.
"It does not reflect the importance and the quality of our relationships."
Israel has maintained there is no proof it was behind the assassination.
Meanwhile retired Liberal MP and former foreign minister, Alexander Downer, says it is "pretty obvious" why the Government made the decision to expel the diplomat.
"In an effort to try to beat Finland and Luxembourg, the Australian Government is going out of its way to ingratiate itself to other countries in the Middle East, to build up its credentials with the Gulf Cooperation Council and other Middle Eastern countries," he said.
"So this is a good way of doing it. That's what's driven this. It's not a point of principle.
"Israel is not the only country that engages in this sort of behaviour, frankly, so it's a bit rich to single out Israel."
Nicole McCabe, Joshua Bruce, Adam Korman and Joshua Krycer have been named as the Australians whose passports were forged. All four live in Israel.
Mr Smith says replacement passports have been issued and consular assistance is still being provided to the four Australians.
Abuse of Australian Passports - Statement to the House of Representatives, 24 May 2010 - Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs
AS POSTED HERE ... Abuse of Australian Passports - Statement to the House of Representatives, 24 May 2010 - Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs
Statement to the House of Representatives (check against delivery)
24 May 2010
Mr Speaker
On 25 February, I advised the House of the suspected fraudulent use of a number of Australian passports in connection with the murder of senior Hamas figure Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh.
I now advise the House of the Government's response to this matter.
First it is worth recalling the circumstances in which this came to the Government's attention and our response to date.
On 20 January, Mr Al-Mabhouh was found murdered in a hotel room in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.
On 16 February, police in Dubai announced that falsified passports from the United Kingdom, Ireland, France and Germany had been used in connection with the murder.
Late on 22 February, Dubai authorities approached Australian officials with an inquiry about two Australian passports.
The following day, 23 February, Dubai authorities confirmed to Australian officials that they were investigating a number of Australian passports in connection with the murder.
Since that time, Dubai authorities have announced that they are investigating four Australian passports in connection with the murder.
Those four Australian passports are in the names of: Mr Adam Korman, Mr Joshua Bruce, Ms Nicole McCabe, and Mr Joshua Krycer.
From the first contact on 22 February, Australian authorities have cooperated fully with Dubai investigators.
On 25 February, I expressed to the House my concern that these Australian passports had been used fraudulently.
Both the Prime Minister and I condemned in the strongest possible terms this apparent misuse and abuse of Australian passports.
On 25 February, I also announced that the Australian Federal Police, in conjunction with relevant agencies, had been asked to investigate the possible abuse of these passports.
These agencies included the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), the Australian Secret Intelligence Service (ASIS) and the Australian Passport Office.
On 9 April, I received the Australian Federal Police report.
Upon a preliminary assessment of that report, it was clear that further work and advice was required from other agencies, in particular ASIO and ASIS.
I made this known publicly on 11 April.
This further work included a visit to Israel this month by the Director General of ASIO.
I received my final advice from agencies last week.
I briefed the National Security Committee of the Cabinet this morning and have taken steps to ensure that the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs has been briefed.
This advice leads to the following key conclusions:
Firstly, and very importantly, there is absolutely no evidence to suggest that those Australian passport holders identified by Dubai authorities were anything other than innocent victims of identity theft;
Secondly, the passports in question were deliberately counterfeited and cloned for use. The high quality of these counterfeited passports points to the involvement of a State intelligence service;
Thirdly, these investigations and advice have left the Government in no doubt that Israel was responsible for the abuse and counterfeiting of these passports.
I note that a similar conclusion was reached by the United Kingdom Government in the course of their official investigations.
No Government can tolerate the abuse of its passports, especially by a foreign Government.
This represents a clear affront to the security of our passport system.
Nor can we tolerate the abuse by a foreign Government of the personal details of the Australian nationals concerned.
These are not the actions of a friend.
I regret to advise the House that this is not the first occasion that Australian passports have been misused by Israeli authorities.
The Dubai passports incident also constitutes a clear and direct breach of confidential understandings between Australia and Israel dating back some years.
This is not what we expect from a nation with whom we have had such a close, friendly and supportive relationship.
After careful deliberation, the Government has asked that a member of the Israeli Embassy in Canberra be withdrawn from Australia. I have asked that the withdrawal be effected within the week.
Earlier this morning, at my request, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade called in the Israeli Charge d'Affaires. Israeli Ambassador Rotem, whom I called in on 25 February, is absent from Australia until 8 June. If Ambassador Rotem had been in Australia, I would have again spoken to him myself.
The Department conveyed the Government's deep disappointment over Israeli involvement in this affair.
The Department made it clear that Australia regarded the abuse of these passports as inconsistent with the friendship and support provided by successive Australian Governments to Israel since its creation as a nation.
Australia's relationship with Israel has always been founded on a basis of mutual respect and trust.
But Israel's actions in this regard have undermined that respect and trust.
The Government takes this step much more in sorrow than in anger or retaliation.
It is a decision taken in our national security interests.
The Government has done so in accordance with the findings of the investigation and after a careful assessment of Australia's national interests by relevant agencies.
The Government, through the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, will continue to provide consular assistance on an as needs basis to those Australians whose identities were stolen and who were therefore adversely affected by Israel's actions.
We have already, on request, replaced the passports of a number of those involved.
I convey publicly a final point made to the Israeli Charge d'Affaires by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade:
Insofar as the Australia-Israel bilateral relationship is concerned, our expectation is that our relationship with Israel can and will continue in a mutually productive and beneficial manner.
Australia's support for the State of Israel goes back to its creation.
Australia's support for the State of Israel has long enjoyed bipartisan support.
We have always shared a relationship reflecting our joint commitment to freedom, security and democracy.
Australia remains a firm friend of Israel.
But, as I noted previously, our relationship must be conducted on the basis of mutual trust and respect.
Genuine friendship runs both ways.
We expect this and future Israeli Governments to ensure that this incident is not repeated.
We now look forward to working to restore the highest standards of trust in our relationship with Israel.
I thank the House.
Media inquiries
Foreign Minister's Office: (02) 6277 7500
Departmental Media Liaison: (02) 6261 1555
Statement to the House of Representatives (check against delivery)
24 May 2010
Mr Speaker
On 25 February, I advised the House of the suspected fraudulent use of a number of Australian passports in connection with the murder of senior Hamas figure Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh.
I now advise the House of the Government's response to this matter.
First it is worth recalling the circumstances in which this came to the Government's attention and our response to date.
On 20 January, Mr Al-Mabhouh was found murdered in a hotel room in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.
On 16 February, police in Dubai announced that falsified passports from the United Kingdom, Ireland, France and Germany had been used in connection with the murder.
Late on 22 February, Dubai authorities approached Australian officials with an inquiry about two Australian passports.
The following day, 23 February, Dubai authorities confirmed to Australian officials that they were investigating a number of Australian passports in connection with the murder.
Since that time, Dubai authorities have announced that they are investigating four Australian passports in connection with the murder.
Those four Australian passports are in the names of: Mr Adam Korman, Mr Joshua Bruce, Ms Nicole McCabe, and Mr Joshua Krycer.
From the first contact on 22 February, Australian authorities have cooperated fully with Dubai investigators.
On 25 February, I expressed to the House my concern that these Australian passports had been used fraudulently.
Both the Prime Minister and I condemned in the strongest possible terms this apparent misuse and abuse of Australian passports.
On 25 February, I also announced that the Australian Federal Police, in conjunction with relevant agencies, had been asked to investigate the possible abuse of these passports.
These agencies included the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), the Australian Secret Intelligence Service (ASIS) and the Australian Passport Office.
On 9 April, I received the Australian Federal Police report.
Upon a preliminary assessment of that report, it was clear that further work and advice was required from other agencies, in particular ASIO and ASIS.
I made this known publicly on 11 April.
This further work included a visit to Israel this month by the Director General of ASIO.
I received my final advice from agencies last week.
I briefed the National Security Committee of the Cabinet this morning and have taken steps to ensure that the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs has been briefed.
This advice leads to the following key conclusions:
Firstly, and very importantly, there is absolutely no evidence to suggest that those Australian passport holders identified by Dubai authorities were anything other than innocent victims of identity theft;
Secondly, the passports in question were deliberately counterfeited and cloned for use. The high quality of these counterfeited passports points to the involvement of a State intelligence service;
Thirdly, these investigations and advice have left the Government in no doubt that Israel was responsible for the abuse and counterfeiting of these passports.
I note that a similar conclusion was reached by the United Kingdom Government in the course of their official investigations.
No Government can tolerate the abuse of its passports, especially by a foreign Government.
This represents a clear affront to the security of our passport system.
Nor can we tolerate the abuse by a foreign Government of the personal details of the Australian nationals concerned.
These are not the actions of a friend.
I regret to advise the House that this is not the first occasion that Australian passports have been misused by Israeli authorities.
The Dubai passports incident also constitutes a clear and direct breach of confidential understandings between Australia and Israel dating back some years.
This is not what we expect from a nation with whom we have had such a close, friendly and supportive relationship.
After careful deliberation, the Government has asked that a member of the Israeli Embassy in Canberra be withdrawn from Australia. I have asked that the withdrawal be effected within the week.
Earlier this morning, at my request, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade called in the Israeli Charge d'Affaires. Israeli Ambassador Rotem, whom I called in on 25 February, is absent from Australia until 8 June. If Ambassador Rotem had been in Australia, I would have again spoken to him myself.
The Department conveyed the Government's deep disappointment over Israeli involvement in this affair.
The Department made it clear that Australia regarded the abuse of these passports as inconsistent with the friendship and support provided by successive Australian Governments to Israel since its creation as a nation.
Australia's relationship with Israel has always been founded on a basis of mutual respect and trust.
But Israel's actions in this regard have undermined that respect and trust.
The Government takes this step much more in sorrow than in anger or retaliation.
It is a decision taken in our national security interests.
The Government has done so in accordance with the findings of the investigation and after a careful assessment of Australia's national interests by relevant agencies.
The Government, through the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, will continue to provide consular assistance on an as needs basis to those Australians whose identities were stolen and who were therefore adversely affected by Israel's actions.
We have already, on request, replaced the passports of a number of those involved.
I convey publicly a final point made to the Israeli Charge d'Affaires by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade:
Insofar as the Australia-Israel bilateral relationship is concerned, our expectation is that our relationship with Israel can and will continue in a mutually productive and beneficial manner.
Australia's support for the State of Israel goes back to its creation.
Australia's support for the State of Israel has long enjoyed bipartisan support.
We have always shared a relationship reflecting our joint commitment to freedom, security and democracy.
Australia remains a firm friend of Israel.
But, as I noted previously, our relationship must be conducted on the basis of mutual trust and respect.
Genuine friendship runs both ways.
We expect this and future Israeli Governments to ensure that this incident is not repeated.
We now look forward to working to restore the highest standards of trust in our relationship with Israel.
I thank the House.
Media inquiries
Foreign Minister's Office: (02) 6277 7500
Departmental Media Liaison: (02) 6261 1555
Embassy official to be expelled | J-Wire
AS POSTED HERE ,,, Embassy official to be expelled | J-Wire
Foreign Minister Stephen Smith has directed that a member of the Israeli Embassy be withdrawn from Australia within a week following the investigation of the Dubai passports affair.
Stephen Smith
He said: “The investigaion and advice have left the Government in no doubt that Israel was responsible for the abuse and counterfeiting of these passports,” adding “these are not the actions of a friend”
The Minister has told parliament that the Israeli Charge D’Affaires was summoned to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade this morning.
Dubai authorities announced that four Australian passports had been used by those held responsible for the assassination of Hamas leader Mahmouhd al-Madbouh on January 20 this year.
The Minister told the House on February-25 that the passports “had been used fraudulently” and he condemned in the strongest terms possible the “misuse and abuse of Australian passports.” On the same day, the Australian Federal Police launched their investigation into the misuse of the passports. Others involved included ASIO [Australian Security Intelligence Organisation, ASIS [the Australian Secret Intelligence Service] and the Australian Passport Office.
The Director-General of ASIO visited Israel earlier this month following the tabling of the initial report.
Smith, who received the further report last week, told Parliament: “I briefed the National Security Committee of the Cabinet this morning.” He also briefed the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and the Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs.
He said the report made it clear that the passport holders identified by Dubai authorities “were no more tha innocent victims of identity fraud.”
He then made it clear the passports were “deliberately counterfeited and cloned for use” and that the high quality of the fake passports points to a State intelligence service.
In his announcement Foreign Minister Smith said that the Department made it clear that Australia regards the abuse of these passports as inconsistent with the friendship and support provided by successive Australian governments to Israel since its creation as a nation.
He said: Australia’s relationship with Israel has always been funded on a basis of mutual respect and trust.”
Smith said: “The Government takes this step much more in sorrow than in anger or retaliation. Australia’s support for Israel has long enjoyed bi-partisan support. Australia remains a firm friend for Israel. We expect this and future Israeli governments to ensure that this incident is not repeated.”
Ambassador Yuval Rotem and Deputy Chief of Mission Eli Yerushalami are both currently overeseas.
Foreign Minister Stephen Smith has directed that a member of the Israeli Embassy be withdrawn from Australia within a week following the investigation of the Dubai passports affair.
Stephen Smith
He said: “The investigaion and advice have left the Government in no doubt that Israel was responsible for the abuse and counterfeiting of these passports,” adding “these are not the actions of a friend”
The Minister has told parliament that the Israeli Charge D’Affaires was summoned to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade this morning.
Dubai authorities announced that four Australian passports had been used by those held responsible for the assassination of Hamas leader Mahmouhd al-Madbouh on January 20 this year.
The Minister told the House on February-25 that the passports “had been used fraudulently” and he condemned in the strongest terms possible the “misuse and abuse of Australian passports.” On the same day, the Australian Federal Police launched their investigation into the misuse of the passports. Others involved included ASIO [Australian Security Intelligence Organisation, ASIS [the Australian Secret Intelligence Service] and the Australian Passport Office.
The Director-General of ASIO visited Israel earlier this month following the tabling of the initial report.
Smith, who received the further report last week, told Parliament: “I briefed the National Security Committee of the Cabinet this morning.” He also briefed the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and the Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs.
He said the report made it clear that the passport holders identified by Dubai authorities “were no more tha innocent victims of identity fraud.”
He then made it clear the passports were “deliberately counterfeited and cloned for use” and that the high quality of the fake passports points to a State intelligence service.
In his announcement Foreign Minister Smith said that the Department made it clear that Australia regards the abuse of these passports as inconsistent with the friendship and support provided by successive Australian governments to Israel since its creation as a nation.
He said: Australia’s relationship with Israel has always been funded on a basis of mutual respect and trust.”
Smith said: “The Government takes this step much more in sorrow than in anger or retaliation. Australia’s support for Israel has long enjoyed bi-partisan support. Australia remains a firm friend for Israel. We expect this and future Israeli governments to ensure that this incident is not repeated.”
Ambassador Yuval Rotem and Deputy Chief of Mission Eli Yerushalami are both currently overeseas.
'Spies' report back to Tehran on pro-democracy activists | The Australian
AS POSTED HERE 'Spies' report back to Tehran on pro-democracy activists | The Australian
ASIO and Queensland police are investigating complaints that agents of the Iranian regime connected to Tehran's embassy in Canberra have been harassing and spying on pro-democracy activists in Australia.
The group Queensland Supporters of Democracy for Iran, which staged a protest in Brisbane on Saturday, says at least four Iranian-Australians have been detained and interrogated during visits to Tehran in recent months as a result of their involvement in the pro-democracy movement in Australia.
About 80 QSDI members rallied in Brisbane's Queens Park to protest against the execution of five political dissidents in Tehran earlier this month. QSDI convenor Mehran Rafiei says the turnout was smaller than for previous events because of fears that pro-regime "spies" within the Iranian-Australian community were reporting back to Tehran.
"Many people in the Iranian community are scared to turn up," Mr Rafiei said.
RELATED COVERAGE
Facing up to Tehran's tyrants
The Australian, 7 hours ago
Web makes its big-screen presence felt
The Australian, 5 days ago
Court targets Iranian expats
The Australian, 8 Apr 2010
Students held on trips back to Iran
The Australian, 7 Apr 2010
Iranian embassy 'spying on activist students'
The Australian, 5 Apr 2010
"They rang me and told me: 'We're scared, we want to go to Iran and we don't want to be arrested.'
"I told them the best way was to turn out and protest, but they're scared -- it's a brutal regime."
One Iranian-Australian detained and interrogated in Tehran recently was shown photographs of himself attending an earlier rally in Brisbane and given a list of names that included the leaders of QSDI and other pro-democracy campaigners in Australia. The man was told their activities constituted the crime of "moharebeh", which means enmity against God and can carry the death penalty in Tehran. Mr Rafiei says his wife and daughter are now afraid to return to Tehran to visit his wife's mother.
The rally was held to protest against the execution in Tehran on May 9 of five political dissidents accused of "moharebeh" for their involvement in banned groups. Amnesty International says the five were denied fair trials; three had been tortured and two had confessed under duress.
The five included a woman, 28-year-old Shirin Alam Holi, who was accused of belonging to another group, The Party for a Free Life in Kurdistan.
In a letter from prison before her execution, she described being beaten on the soles of her feet, kicked in the stomach and force-fed through nasal tubes when she went on a hunger strike. She said she had made a confession after she was hospitalised and given an injection.
Amnesty International says the executions were a blatant attempt to intimidate dissidents in the lead-up to the first anniversary of last year's June elections, when Mahmoud Ahmadinejad claimed victory in a result believed to have been rigged. The anniversary on June 12 is expected to prompt a new wave of pro-democracy activity.
Amnesty International has recorded more than 80 executions in Iran so far this year.
ASIO and Queensland police are investigating complaints that agents of the Iranian regime connected to Tehran's embassy in Canberra have been harassing and spying on pro-democracy activists in Australia.
The group Queensland Supporters of Democracy for Iran, which staged a protest in Brisbane on Saturday, says at least four Iranian-Australians have been detained and interrogated during visits to Tehran in recent months as a result of their involvement in the pro-democracy movement in Australia.
About 80 QSDI members rallied in Brisbane's Queens Park to protest against the execution of five political dissidents in Tehran earlier this month. QSDI convenor Mehran Rafiei says the turnout was smaller than for previous events because of fears that pro-regime "spies" within the Iranian-Australian community were reporting back to Tehran.
"Many people in the Iranian community are scared to turn up," Mr Rafiei said.
RELATED COVERAGE
Facing up to Tehran's tyrants
The Australian, 7 hours ago
Web makes its big-screen presence felt
The Australian, 5 days ago
Court targets Iranian expats
The Australian, 8 Apr 2010
Students held on trips back to Iran
The Australian, 7 Apr 2010
Iranian embassy 'spying on activist students'
The Australian, 5 Apr 2010
"They rang me and told me: 'We're scared, we want to go to Iran and we don't want to be arrested.'
"I told them the best way was to turn out and protest, but they're scared -- it's a brutal regime."
One Iranian-Australian detained and interrogated in Tehran recently was shown photographs of himself attending an earlier rally in Brisbane and given a list of names that included the leaders of QSDI and other pro-democracy campaigners in Australia. The man was told their activities constituted the crime of "moharebeh", which means enmity against God and can carry the death penalty in Tehran. Mr Rafiei says his wife and daughter are now afraid to return to Tehran to visit his wife's mother.
The rally was held to protest against the execution in Tehran on May 9 of five political dissidents accused of "moharebeh" for their involvement in banned groups. Amnesty International says the five were denied fair trials; three had been tortured and two had confessed under duress.
The five included a woman, 28-year-old Shirin Alam Holi, who was accused of belonging to another group, The Party for a Free Life in Kurdistan.
In a letter from prison before her execution, she described being beaten on the soles of her feet, kicked in the stomach and force-fed through nasal tubes when she went on a hunger strike. She said she had made a confession after she was hospitalised and given an injection.
Amnesty International says the executions were a blatant attempt to intimidate dissidents in the lead-up to the first anniversary of last year's June elections, when Mahmoud Ahmadinejad claimed victory in a result believed to have been rigged. The anniversary on June 12 is expected to prompt a new wave of pro-democracy activity.
Amnesty International has recorded more than 80 executions in Iran so far this year.
Sunday, 23 May 2010
Deporting shiite sheikh ‘would breach human rights’ — Winds Of Jihad By SheikYerMami
AS POSTED HERE ---> Deporting shiite sheikh ‘would breach human rights’ — Winds Of Jihad By SheikYerMami
The Federal Government has been accused of ignoring international human rights conventions by deciding to deport a Sydney Muslim Shia cleric.
Australians no longer have human rights. The Muslim dominated UN dictates that Muslim rights abrogate our “man made” law. Australian politicians and the judiciary have abdicated their responsibility. Our elected “leaders” no longer safeguard the interests of the people. Islam rules.
Can’t get rid of him:
Dr Leghaei’s wife and son have been granted permanent residency.
Iranian-born Sheikh Mansour Leghaei, who has lived in Australia for the past 16 years, will be deported within six weeks because ASIO made an adverse security finding against him in 1997.
The United Nations advised the Government not to deport the sheikh because of claims he had been denied a fair hearing over the adverse security finding.
Dr Leghaei had asked Immigration Minister Chris Evans to use his ministerial power to allow him to stay in Australia.
Senator Evans said he carefully considered whether to stop the cleric being deported from Australia but declined to intervene in his case.
“The Department has spoken to him this morning and advised him that his wife and son have been granted visas on the basis of their long-term residence and their connection and integration in Australia,” Senator Evans said.
“But because of the adverse security assessment on Dr Leghaei he will not be granted a visa and I will not intervene on his behalf.”
Dr Leghaei’s supporters say he is a leader of inter-faith relations between Muslims and Christians.
He has been fighting to get permanent residency for 13 years.
But standing in his way is the ASIO security assessment, which says he is a threat to national security and is suspected of “acts of foreign interference”.
Under Australian law, ASIO is under no obligation to tell Dr Leghaei why it suspects him, so he has taken his case to the Immigration Review Tribunal, the Federal and High Courts.
The sheikh says he has never been told of the allegations contained in his ASIO file or been given the chance to respond to them.
“That is the mystery in this case, that you are thought to be a risk to national security, despite all the positive work that you have done here and despite all numerous letters of support,” he said.
“It’s not only local community, the wider community also knows me and respects all what I’ve done.”
The sheikh’s barristers have written to the United Nations claiming the Government’s treatment of his case violates his human rights under international covenants that Australia has signed.
The co-director of Sydney University’s Centre for international law, Ben Saul, is one of the barristers representing the sheikh.
Associate Professor Saul says the sheikh should be given a chance to answer the allegations against him.
“If there’s evidence, all the sheikh asks is that evidence be provided to him so that he can challenge it,” he said.
“How can a person get a fair trial? How can a person get a fair hearing unless they see at least some of the evidence against them? The sheikh’s seen nothing.
“He’s been denied an opportunity for a fair hearing in his national security deportation assessment.
“International human rights law requires that a person be given sufficient information or access to the evidence against them before they’re deported on national security grounds.
“And at no time has the sheikh been able to see any of the evidence against him.”
Today Associate Professor Saul produced copies of a letter the UN wrote to the Australian Government on April 21 asking it not to deport Dr Leghaei for at least a year, while it considered his case.
“If Australia proceeds to deport the sheikh it will be in direct contravention of its obligations under its international human rights treaties and in direct contravention of a specific order issued by the UN committee,” he said
The Federal Government has been accused of ignoring international human rights conventions by deciding to deport a Sydney Muslim Shia cleric.
Australians no longer have human rights. The Muslim dominated UN dictates that Muslim rights abrogate our “man made” law. Australian politicians and the judiciary have abdicated their responsibility. Our elected “leaders” no longer safeguard the interests of the people. Islam rules.
Can’t get rid of him:
Dr Leghaei’s wife and son have been granted permanent residency.
Iranian-born Sheikh Mansour Leghaei, who has lived in Australia for the past 16 years, will be deported within six weeks because ASIO made an adverse security finding against him in 1997.
The United Nations advised the Government not to deport the sheikh because of claims he had been denied a fair hearing over the adverse security finding.
Dr Leghaei had asked Immigration Minister Chris Evans to use his ministerial power to allow him to stay in Australia.
Senator Evans said he carefully considered whether to stop the cleric being deported from Australia but declined to intervene in his case.
“The Department has spoken to him this morning and advised him that his wife and son have been granted visas on the basis of their long-term residence and their connection and integration in Australia,” Senator Evans said.
“But because of the adverse security assessment on Dr Leghaei he will not be granted a visa and I will not intervene on his behalf.”
Dr Leghaei’s supporters say he is a leader of inter-faith relations between Muslims and Christians.
He has been fighting to get permanent residency for 13 years.
But standing in his way is the ASIO security assessment, which says he is a threat to national security and is suspected of “acts of foreign interference”.
Under Australian law, ASIO is under no obligation to tell Dr Leghaei why it suspects him, so he has taken his case to the Immigration Review Tribunal, the Federal and High Courts.
The sheikh says he has never been told of the allegations contained in his ASIO file or been given the chance to respond to them.
“That is the mystery in this case, that you are thought to be a risk to national security, despite all the positive work that you have done here and despite all numerous letters of support,” he said.
“It’s not only local community, the wider community also knows me and respects all what I’ve done.”
The sheikh’s barristers have written to the United Nations claiming the Government’s treatment of his case violates his human rights under international covenants that Australia has signed.
The co-director of Sydney University’s Centre for international law, Ben Saul, is one of the barristers representing the sheikh.
Associate Professor Saul says the sheikh should be given a chance to answer the allegations against him.
“If there’s evidence, all the sheikh asks is that evidence be provided to him so that he can challenge it,” he said.
“How can a person get a fair trial? How can a person get a fair hearing unless they see at least some of the evidence against them? The sheikh’s seen nothing.
“He’s been denied an opportunity for a fair hearing in his national security deportation assessment.
“International human rights law requires that a person be given sufficient information or access to the evidence against them before they’re deported on national security grounds.
“And at no time has the sheikh been able to see any of the evidence against him.”
Today Associate Professor Saul produced copies of a letter the UN wrote to the Australian Government on April 21 asking it not to deport Dr Leghaei for at least a year, while it considered his case.
“If Australia proceeds to deport the sheikh it will be in direct contravention of its obligations under its international human rights treaties and in direct contravention of a specific order issued by the UN committee,” he said
Tuesday, 18 May 2010
Man acquitted over ASIO leak - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
Man acquitted over ASIO leak - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
A former ASIO officer found guilty of leaking confidential documents to the media has won an appeal against his conviction.
James Paul Seivers was last year found guilty of taking home classified documents related to terrorism threats in Indonesia before the Bali bombings.
His former housemate, Francis Matthew O'Ryan, was also found guilty of aiding Mr Seivers by sending the information to The Australian newspaper in 2004.
Mr Seivers was sentenced to 12 months' jail with six months to be served as periodic detention.
The ACT Court of Appeal today overturned Mr Seivers' guilty verdict, finding the fairness of the trial was compromised.
It said there was no possibility of a new trial and entered a verdict of acquittal.
A former ASIO officer found guilty of leaking confidential documents to the media has won an appeal against his conviction.
James Paul Seivers was last year found guilty of taking home classified documents related to terrorism threats in Indonesia before the Bali bombings.
His former housemate, Francis Matthew O'Ryan, was also found guilty of aiding Mr Seivers by sending the information to The Australian newspaper in 2004.
Mr Seivers was sentenced to 12 months' jail with six months to be served as periodic detention.
The ACT Court of Appeal today overturned Mr Seivers' guilty verdict, finding the fairness of the trial was compromised.
It said there was no possibility of a new trial and entered a verdict of acquittal.
Saturday, 15 May 2010
ASIO: The Enemy Within � Catrina Bourbon
AS POSTED HERE ---> ASIO: The Enemy Within � Catrina Bourbon
ASIO: The Enemy Within : ASIO: The Enemy Within is a book that is long overdue. If you want to know what ASIO has been doing in and to our society, this is the book for you. Other books have been written about ASIO, but this book is unique in many ways. No one is better qualified to deal with Australias premier domestic nosey parker than Michael Tubbs, one of the few barristers who took the fight up to ASIO by appearing for clients who had fallen foul of its powers. No punches are pulled as Tubbs tries to deliver the Knock-out blow to ASIO and put it out of business. If you want to know how ASIOs national network of political spies have surreptitiously and manipulatively affected Australias free society and changed its political landscape, you need to read this book.
ASIO: The Enemy Within : ASIO: The Enemy Within is a book that is long overdue. If you want to know what ASIO has been doing in and to our society, this is the book for you. Other books have been written about ASIO, but this book is unique in many ways. No one is better qualified to deal with Australias premier domestic nosey parker than Michael Tubbs, one of the few barristers who took the fight up to ASIO by appearing for clients who had fallen foul of its powers. No punches are pulled as Tubbs tries to deliver the Knock-out blow to ASIO and put it out of business. If you want to know how ASIOs national network of political spies have surreptitiously and manipulatively affected Australias free society and changed its political landscape, you need to read this book.
Wednesday, 12 May 2010
Diplomats are learning to do more with less
AS POSTED HERE ---> Diplomats are learning to do more with less
Kevin Rudd's chosen new head of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Dennis Richardson, has set out a bold mission statement for his diplomats in budget documents: to spearhead a "whole of government" approach to key international issues.
But he has been given precious few resources in the budget to put this into effect. For all Rudd's big objectives in foreign affairs, the "diplomatic deficit" criticised by the Lowy Institute last year continues.
Foreign Affairs continues to operate with a budget showing a modest 6.75 per cent increase to $2.212 billion for its core functions of reporting the world and representing Australia.
This is to pursue such goals as Rudd's vision of an Asia-Pacific Community by 2020, persuading the world to do without nuclear weapons, bringing India up to the top rank of Australia's foreign relationships, and winning a United Nations Security Council seat in two years' time.
The latter goal is the most expensive one. It involves cultivating scores of countries previously perceived as peripheral to Australian interests, 50 of them in Africa, in the hope they will vote for Australia over Finland and Luxembourg in a ballot for the rotating place at the UN top table.
To this end, Stephen Smith has been going to capitals where no Australian foreign minister has trod before, and entertaining a colourful procession of African leaders in Canberra. Plans are afoot to open a new Australian embassy in Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital that also hosts the headquarters of the African Union. The mission will include a military officer to co-ordinate support for the African Union's growing security role in places such as Sudan and Somalia.
The budget includes a substantial aid allocation for Africa this year, $200 million.
Commendably, the foreign aid agency that comes under the department is the main winner. AusAID's allocation goes up by $531 million, or 14 per cent, to $4.35 billion, and its traditional customers have not been ignored, with substantial increases to Papua New Guinea, Indonesia, East Timor and the Pacific island nations.
Foreign Affairs itself has made some savings from internal efficiencies and the strong Australian dollar, but has pared back funding for consular and passport services for Australian travellers, and made a savage cut to public diplomacy. The Australian Secret Intelligence Service, coming under the department, has no growth in real funding.
Rudd has also stripped Australian diplomacy of some intangible assets. His early accession to the Kyoto Treaty and apology to the Aboriginal stolen generation gained Australia new kudos in the Third World countries whose UN vote he seeks. The ETS reversal and the continued, controversial "intervention" have diminished his diplomatic capital.
Kevin Rudd's chosen new head of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Dennis Richardson, has set out a bold mission statement for his diplomats in budget documents: to spearhead a "whole of government" approach to key international issues.
But he has been given precious few resources in the budget to put this into effect. For all Rudd's big objectives in foreign affairs, the "diplomatic deficit" criticised by the Lowy Institute last year continues.
Foreign Affairs continues to operate with a budget showing a modest 6.75 per cent increase to $2.212 billion for its core functions of reporting the world and representing Australia.
This is to pursue such goals as Rudd's vision of an Asia-Pacific Community by 2020, persuading the world to do without nuclear weapons, bringing India up to the top rank of Australia's foreign relationships, and winning a United Nations Security Council seat in two years' time.
The latter goal is the most expensive one. It involves cultivating scores of countries previously perceived as peripheral to Australian interests, 50 of them in Africa, in the hope they will vote for Australia over Finland and Luxembourg in a ballot for the rotating place at the UN top table.
To this end, Stephen Smith has been going to capitals where no Australian foreign minister has trod before, and entertaining a colourful procession of African leaders in Canberra. Plans are afoot to open a new Australian embassy in Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital that also hosts the headquarters of the African Union. The mission will include a military officer to co-ordinate support for the African Union's growing security role in places such as Sudan and Somalia.
The budget includes a substantial aid allocation for Africa this year, $200 million.
Commendably, the foreign aid agency that comes under the department is the main winner. AusAID's allocation goes up by $531 million, or 14 per cent, to $4.35 billion, and its traditional customers have not been ignored, with substantial increases to Papua New Guinea, Indonesia, East Timor and the Pacific island nations.
Foreign Affairs itself has made some savings from internal efficiencies and the strong Australian dollar, but has pared back funding for consular and passport services for Australian travellers, and made a savage cut to public diplomacy. The Australian Secret Intelligence Service, coming under the department, has no growth in real funding.
Rudd has also stripped Australian diplomacy of some intangible assets. His early accession to the Kyoto Treaty and apology to the Aboriginal stolen generation gained Australia new kudos in the Third World countries whose UN vote he seeks. The ETS reversal and the continued, controversial "intervention" have diminished his diplomatic capital.
Monday, 10 May 2010
Australia Takes Aim At People Smuggling, Human Trafficking | Gov Monitor
AS POSTED HERE ---> Australia Takes Aim At People Smuggling, Human Trafficking | Gov Monitor
The Australian Government today welcomed the report of the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee into the Anti-People Smuggling and Other Measures Bill 2010.
The Committee’s report provides bipartisan support for the Bill which aims to significantly strengthen Australia’s people smuggling laws.
The Bill will enable the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) to specifically investigate people smuggling and other serious border security threats and will also allow national security agencies to collect foreign intelligence about non-State actors, including people smugglers and their networks.
In addition, the Bill will include additional offences targeting those who finance or provide support for people smuggling activities as well as strong penalties that recognise the seriousness of people smuggling offences, including:
creating a new offence of providing material support for people smuggling with a maximum penalty of ten years imprisonment and/or a fine of $110,000;
creating a new offence of people smuggling involving exploitation or danger of death or serious harm, applying to ventures entering Australia, with a maximum penalty of twenty years imprisonment and/or a fine of $220,000;
ensuring that where a person is convicted of multiple people smuggling offences, mandatory minimum penalties set out in the Migration Act are applied; and
providing greater clarity and consistency by harmonising people smuggling offences in the Migration Act and the Criminal Code.
The Senate Committee strongly endorsed the Government’s view that the proposed new offence of ‘providing material support for people smuggling’ appropriately targets organised criminal networks which facilitate and profit from people smuggling.
The Government is committed to targeting criminal groups who organise, participate in and benefit from people smuggling activities.
This legislation represents an important part of the Government’s comprehensive approach to combating people smuggling.
The Government will now seek to expedite the passage of this important legislation and calls on the Opposition to support it through the Parliament.
The Australian Government today welcomed the report of the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee into the Anti-People Smuggling and Other Measures Bill 2010.
The Committee’s report provides bipartisan support for the Bill which aims to significantly strengthen Australia’s people smuggling laws.
The Bill will enable the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) to specifically investigate people smuggling and other serious border security threats and will also allow national security agencies to collect foreign intelligence about non-State actors, including people smugglers and their networks.
In addition, the Bill will include additional offences targeting those who finance or provide support for people smuggling activities as well as strong penalties that recognise the seriousness of people smuggling offences, including:
creating a new offence of providing material support for people smuggling with a maximum penalty of ten years imprisonment and/or a fine of $110,000;
creating a new offence of people smuggling involving exploitation or danger of death or serious harm, applying to ventures entering Australia, with a maximum penalty of twenty years imprisonment and/or a fine of $220,000;
ensuring that where a person is convicted of multiple people smuggling offences, mandatory minimum penalties set out in the Migration Act are applied; and
providing greater clarity and consistency by harmonising people smuggling offences in the Migration Act and the Criminal Code.
The Senate Committee strongly endorsed the Government’s view that the proposed new offence of ‘providing material support for people smuggling’ appropriately targets organised criminal networks which facilitate and profit from people smuggling.
The Government is committed to targeting criminal groups who organise, participate in and benefit from people smuggling activities.
This legislation represents an important part of the Government’s comprehensive approach to combating people smuggling.
The Government will now seek to expedite the passage of this important legislation and calls on the Opposition to support it through the Parliament.
Saturday, 8 May 2010
Spooks spill, to each other
as posted here
THIS book will never sit on the shelf next to Ian Fleming or John le Carre, or even trouble the bestseller lists - though the contents will undoubtedly rank as a great thriller.
Australia's overseas spy agency - the Australian Secret Intelligence Service - has commissioned a history of its operations.
But only a chosen few will have a chance to snare a copy and read this intriguing story. ASIS did not officially exist until the late 1970s, and the clandestine work of the service remains jealously protected.
Nearing its 60th birthday, the nation's spooks have decided to put their story on the record. Well, so-to-speak.
The Age believes the history will delve into all the service's dirty laundry, starting with recent operations in Afghanistan and Iraq to battles with people smugglers closer to home, and stretching all the way back to the Cold War.
Taxpayers won't get a peek between the covers, despite shelling out $300 million in funding to the organisation each year. The history will be stamped at the highest classification level, intended only as a teaching tool for the service's new recruits and old hands to learn from the past.
A heavily sanitised version may be considered for public release, but a final decision won't be taken until the classified history is completed.
ASIS is believed to have sought out prominent military historian Peter Edwards for advice on how to best go about the project. Professor Edwards - the official historian of the Vietnam War for the Australian War Memorial - declined to comment when contacted yesterday by The Age.
But it is believed Professor Edwards provided initial expert advice, with the history now to be written in-house.
ASIS posts its officers in embassies around the world to collect secrets for the Australian government.
With headquarters in the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade building in Canberra, the spy outfit reports to Foreign Minister Stephen Smith.
Asked about the ASIS history, a foreign affairs spokesman said ''the Australian government does not comment on intelligence matters''.
Need-to-know, old chap - wink, wink.
as posted here
THIS book will never sit on the shelf next to Ian Fleming or John le Carre, or even trouble the bestseller lists - though the contents will undoubtedly rank as a great thriller.
Australia's overseas spy agency - the Australian Secret Intelligence Service - has commissioned a history of its operations.
But only a chosen few will have a chance to snare a copy and read this intriguing story. ASIS did not officially exist until the late 1970s, and the clandestine work of the service remains jealously protected.
Nearing its 60th birthday, the nation's spooks have decided to put their story on the record. Well, so-to-speak.
The Age believes the history will delve into all the service's dirty laundry, starting with recent operations in Afghanistan and Iraq to battles with people smugglers closer to home, and stretching all the way back to the Cold War.
Taxpayers won't get a peek between the covers, despite shelling out $300 million in funding to the organisation each year. The history will be stamped at the highest classification level, intended only as a teaching tool for the service's new recruits and old hands to learn from the past.
A heavily sanitised version may be considered for public release, but a final decision won't be taken until the classified history is completed.
ASIS is believed to have sought out prominent military historian Peter Edwards for advice on how to best go about the project. Professor Edwards - the official historian of the Vietnam War for the Australian War Memorial - declined to comment when contacted yesterday by The Age.
But it is believed Professor Edwards provided initial expert advice, with the history now to be written in-house.
ASIS posts its officers in embassies around the world to collect secrets for the Australian government.
With headquarters in the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade building in Canberra, the spy outfit reports to Foreign Minister Stephen Smith.
Asked about the ASIS history, a foreign affairs spokesman said ''the Australian government does not comment on intelligence matters''.
Need-to-know, old chap - wink, wink.
as posted here
Wednesday, 5 May 2010
�CPA - The Guardian - #1453
AS POSTED HERE ---> �CPA - The Guardian - #1453
Media reports revealed last week that the federal government is planning to allow ASIO officers to carry weapons. Agents of ASIS – Australia’s overseas spy agency – would also be able to carry weapons and launch paramilitary actions in other countries. The Defence Signals Directorate (DSD) would be permitted to carry out domestic wiretaps on request from ASIO or ASIS with a simple warrant from a judge. In the same week, experts and refugee groups went public with grave concerns about proposed legislation that could jail volunteers assisting asylum seekers. Everywhere you look, the federal government is attacking the civil liberties of Australians and tightening the cordon around “fortress Australia”.
The news comes hard on the heels of announcements that the applications for refugee status for Afghans and Sri Lankans have been suspended for six months and three months respectively. The notorious Curtin immigration detention centre in WA has been recommissioned. Australia is breaching its obligations under international law to receive asylum seekers and to process their requests for refuge. (See Rudd government to reopen infamous detention centres.)
The reports follow on the federal government’s refusal to consider key recommendations of the Brennan committee that investigated human rights in Australia and reported to the Federal Attorney General last September. The committee found widespread support in the community for a Human Rights Act but the federal government was having none of that. Its plans were clearly headed in the opposite direction.
The Sydney Morning Herald went public last week with reports from intelligence sources that ASIO officers would soon be able to carry weapons for “self-defence”. There was no evidence given that intelligence officers need protection from the public. On the contrary, there is mounting evidence that the public needs protection from ASIO.
The Law Council of Australia recently wrote to the Attorney General asking that the spy agency be reined in with regard to its investigations. The Council claims ASIO misleads the individuals it interviews into believing they have fewer rights to legal representation and to refrain from answering questions than they actually have under current legislation. In the case of “terror suspect” Izhar ul-Huque in 2003, Justice Adams noted that the agency had been deceptive, intimidating and engaged in a “gross breach of powers”.
ASIS lost its gun licence in 1983 when officers terrorised guests at the Sheraton Hotel in Melbourne during a mock surveillance and hostage rescue exercise. Officers were allowed to carry weapons again in 2004 as a result of the Howard era spy agency power grab that followed 9/11 and the Bali bombings. The latest move would give the local MI6 and CIA equivalent the power to carry out paramilitary actions in other countries. The PM’s National Security Adviser, Duncan Lewis, is a former special forces commander. The move would worsen Australia’s reputation in the region for interference in the internal affairs of its neighbours and heighten tensions.
DSD is said to be getting a powers boost on top of its new $14 million Cyber Security Operations Centre in Canberra. The military agency will be able to perform domestic wiretaps upon request from ASIO or ASIS. All that would be required would be a warrant from an obliging judge. The powers are to be granted in response to a claimed increase in terror threats and cyber attacks. Much is being made of allegations that Australian mining companies’ computers have been subjected to cyber attacks launched from China. In the meantime, the only proven spying charges affecting the mining industry have been those against Australian businessman Stern Hu who was convicted in March of receiving bribes and stealing commercial secrets from China.
Proposed new criminal charges directed against people smuggling have been described as “mind-blowing” by Mary Crock, professor of public law at Sydney University. “These laws capture innocent people who may be operating under perfectly good and humanitarian reasons,” she told the Herald. The law would turn anyone sending money overseas that might eventually be used to pay a people smuggler into a criminal. Australians who assist asylum seekers escape danger and who unwittingly might be helping to engage people smugglers could be jailed for up to 10 years. A pilot who knowingly flies foreigners carrying false documents to Australia would also become a criminal. So would a ship’s captain who rescues asylum seekers on the high seas and brings them to Australia. Arne Rinnan, the captain of the Tampa, would have been caught in this legislative net.
People are fighting back against the persistent attacks on their democratic rights by the federal and state governments. Adelaide construction worker Ark Tribe is willing to go to jail and incur a hefty fine rather than submit to an interrogation by the construction industry’s secret police, the ABCC.
His matter comes before the Magistrates’ Court in Adelaide on June 15. Opponents of the anti-democratic push are having some victories. Key elements of South Australia’s “anti-bikie” legislation that eroded freedom of association were struck down by the SA Supreme Court last September. The Rann government is appealing that ruling in the High Court. Defenders of civil liberties are now pressing for a state-based human rights act in the absence of a national one. The fight to defend democratic rights must be stepped up in response to the Australian governments’ incessant power grab.
Media reports revealed last week that the federal government is planning to allow ASIO officers to carry weapons. Agents of ASIS – Australia’s overseas spy agency – would also be able to carry weapons and launch paramilitary actions in other countries. The Defence Signals Directorate (DSD) would be permitted to carry out domestic wiretaps on request from ASIO or ASIS with a simple warrant from a judge. In the same week, experts and refugee groups went public with grave concerns about proposed legislation that could jail volunteers assisting asylum seekers. Everywhere you look, the federal government is attacking the civil liberties of Australians and tightening the cordon around “fortress Australia”.
The news comes hard on the heels of announcements that the applications for refugee status for Afghans and Sri Lankans have been suspended for six months and three months respectively. The notorious Curtin immigration detention centre in WA has been recommissioned. Australia is breaching its obligations under international law to receive asylum seekers and to process their requests for refuge. (See Rudd government to reopen infamous detention centres.)
The reports follow on the federal government’s refusal to consider key recommendations of the Brennan committee that investigated human rights in Australia and reported to the Federal Attorney General last September. The committee found widespread support in the community for a Human Rights Act but the federal government was having none of that. Its plans were clearly headed in the opposite direction.
The Sydney Morning Herald went public last week with reports from intelligence sources that ASIO officers would soon be able to carry weapons for “self-defence”. There was no evidence given that intelligence officers need protection from the public. On the contrary, there is mounting evidence that the public needs protection from ASIO.
The Law Council of Australia recently wrote to the Attorney General asking that the spy agency be reined in with regard to its investigations. The Council claims ASIO misleads the individuals it interviews into believing they have fewer rights to legal representation and to refrain from answering questions than they actually have under current legislation. In the case of “terror suspect” Izhar ul-Huque in 2003, Justice Adams noted that the agency had been deceptive, intimidating and engaged in a “gross breach of powers”.
ASIS lost its gun licence in 1983 when officers terrorised guests at the Sheraton Hotel in Melbourne during a mock surveillance and hostage rescue exercise. Officers were allowed to carry weapons again in 2004 as a result of the Howard era spy agency power grab that followed 9/11 and the Bali bombings. The latest move would give the local MI6 and CIA equivalent the power to carry out paramilitary actions in other countries. The PM’s National Security Adviser, Duncan Lewis, is a former special forces commander. The move would worsen Australia’s reputation in the region for interference in the internal affairs of its neighbours and heighten tensions.
DSD is said to be getting a powers boost on top of its new $14 million Cyber Security Operations Centre in Canberra. The military agency will be able to perform domestic wiretaps upon request from ASIO or ASIS. All that would be required would be a warrant from an obliging judge. The powers are to be granted in response to a claimed increase in terror threats and cyber attacks. Much is being made of allegations that Australian mining companies’ computers have been subjected to cyber attacks launched from China. In the meantime, the only proven spying charges affecting the mining industry have been those against Australian businessman Stern Hu who was convicted in March of receiving bribes and stealing commercial secrets from China.
Proposed new criminal charges directed against people smuggling have been described as “mind-blowing” by Mary Crock, professor of public law at Sydney University. “These laws capture innocent people who may be operating under perfectly good and humanitarian reasons,” she told the Herald. The law would turn anyone sending money overseas that might eventually be used to pay a people smuggler into a criminal. Australians who assist asylum seekers escape danger and who unwittingly might be helping to engage people smugglers could be jailed for up to 10 years. A pilot who knowingly flies foreigners carrying false documents to Australia would also become a criminal. So would a ship’s captain who rescues asylum seekers on the high seas and brings them to Australia. Arne Rinnan, the captain of the Tampa, would have been caught in this legislative net.
People are fighting back against the persistent attacks on their democratic rights by the federal and state governments. Adelaide construction worker Ark Tribe is willing to go to jail and incur a hefty fine rather than submit to an interrogation by the construction industry’s secret police, the ABCC.
His matter comes before the Magistrates’ Court in Adelaide on June 15. Opponents of the anti-democratic push are having some victories. Key elements of South Australia’s “anti-bikie” legislation that eroded freedom of association were struck down by the SA Supreme Court last September. The Rann government is appealing that ruling in the High Court. Defenders of civil liberties are now pressing for a state-based human rights act in the absence of a national one. The fight to defend democratic rights must be stepped up in response to the Australian governments’ incessant power grab.
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