Transcript: Stephen Smith Interview with Chris Uhlmann ABC 24
Stephen Smith
posted Monday, 16 August 2010
CHRIS UHLMANN: And in fact I am joined now by the Foreign Minister Stephen Smith who hopefully is professional enough not to have his mobile phone switched on.
STEPHEN SMITH: I've left my phone in the car.
UHLMANN: I'm pleased to hear it. Look, before we get onto what we're going to hear today, on the day that Australians go to polls - got to the polls on 21 August, Russian engineers will begin loading nuclear fuel into the Bushehr power plant, nuclear power plant in Iran. Are you at all concerned by that?
SMITH: No, there's nothing inconsistent with the Security Council resolutions and nothing inconsistent with Iran having access to civil nuclear material for civil purposes. Indeed, it does show that Iran does not need to engage in enrichment itself to have access to civil nuclear power. So this is entirely consistent with the Security Council resolutions.
Indeed, in my view, it underlines the point that Iran does not need to enrich its own uranium. In addition to this proposal, we've seen in the past other proposals from Turkey for example that the various reactors in Iran be serviced by low enriched material from other countries. So it underlines the point that Iran can have access to civil nuclear power but not engage in an enrichment process which runs the risk of access to weapons.
UHLMANN: And I understand too that Russia is guaranteeing it will remove this fuel?
SMITH: Well that's part of this arrangement and part of other previous proposals that once the fuel itself is spent then it is removed and taken back to the source country.
UHLMANN: Now just to Pakistan. The head of the UN has been there, he says it's one of the worst disasters he has ever seen. What's Australia doing?
SMITH: Well we've already contributed $10 million in two separate $5 million contributions and over the weekend we saw the first of a C-17 loading and taking supplies. We've had our officials monitoring the situation, as the United Nations' assessment team has said, it's got worse and so we are looking now at what more we can do.
So I'm hopeful that in the next day or two I'll be in a position to announce what further assistance we can provide. But it is a terrible tragedy. The Australian development assistance and NGO community are urging public contributions to the appeal so I also urge that but the Government's made its contribution. We're looking at what more we can do.
UHLMANN: Are you limited at all by the caretaker period?
SMITH: No, because the allocations that we make for humanitarian and emergency assistance are predetermined. They've previously been allocated. It's simply a matter of us allocating monies that have previously been put to one side for these emergency purposes.
And whilst from time to time I might give my counterpart the courtesy of letting her know what we're doing, this is not an area where there's any dispute or consternation or difficulty. I think all Australians want us to be a good international citizen.
So, as I say we've made a $10 million contribution already. In addition to that we're sending supplies off. We expect there'll be another C-17 take off today or tomorrow to deliver further supplies. But because of the worsening situation and the worsening assessments, as I say we're looking at what more we can do and I hope in the next 24 or 36 hours to be able to make that clear.
UHLMANN: One more thing on foreign affairs, to Afghanistan, now General Petraeus who's leading the forces there, says he won't be bound by what the President's timetable was and that timetable was for a withdrawal by the middle of next year. We're starting to see some big difference between what the military and what the civilian administration says.
SMITH: No, I don't think that's right. President Obama when he announced a surge, indicated that in an ideal circumstance if conditions allowed he'd be looking at the start of a draw down by the middle of next year. But that was always conditions based.
In some respects, more importantly, at the very important Afghan conference in Kabul, a month or so ago, the international community, including Australia, committed itself to the objective of handing over the security arrangements to Afghan by 2014, but again that's conditions-based. We can only hand it over if the Afghan army and the Afghan police are in a position to do so.
I've only seen the reports of General Petraeus I haven't looked at the actual transcript, but what he's saying is not dissimilar to what we've been saying, what the Minister of Defence and what I've been saying is that the advice we have is that in two to four years, so in 2012, to 2014 we expect in Oruzgan Province that our training effort will enable the Afghan army and the security services to take responsibility in Oruzgan Province.
UHLMANN: All right, what can we expect to hear from the Prime Minster here today?
SMITH: Well, I think what the Prime Minister will do today will be to outline her view about the country's future, her economic plan, the stark choice between her plan and the lack of economic plan from Tony Abbott. In the run down now to 21 August, Saturday, the five or six days left, the choice on the economy is very clear and very stark.
And if you run a good economy, if you manage the economy well, you can do the things that are also very important to Australian families, like the focus on education, the focus on health and hospitals. So I think her view about the economy will be central to her contribution today.
UHLMANN: But isn't your argument hamstrung by the fact that you got rid of a Prime Minister just seven weeks ago? If the government was going so well then why didn't you hang onto him?
SMITH: Well, we've made that point clear. We know that we ran into difficulties but the only choice now that the Australian community have on offer is that choice between Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott.
You can have Julia Gillard with an economic plan, bringing the budget back into surplus in three years time. Having a modern economy with a modern broadband network that can add impetus and productivity to our economy or they can have Tony Abbott. That's the only choice on offer and it's really the economic management issues that I think the community will now focus on over the next four or five days.
UHLMANN: Now people may not know but you're very adept at looking at matters electoral, how do you see things in Western Australian or Australia more broadly as we head into this last week?
SMITH: Well overall I think it is a knife edge. I mean I see a couple of general polls which are either 50-50 or sort, you know, of a couple of points one way or the other. I think this one is very much in the micro. This will get down to 20 or 30 seats where the election will be determined.
And that applies in Western Australia where I come from and the seats like Hasluck and Swan and Canning and Cowan and Stirling just as it goes for the metropolitan and regional marginal seats in Queensland and New South Wales. So this is not going to be a macro election, this will go down to the wire.
There'll be a small number of seats in it so every vote in every seat in those marginal areas count and that's why people now really have to focus on the choice between Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott, the economy choices, the broadband choices, the education and health choices.
UHLMANN: Stephen Smith, thank you.
SMITH: Thanks Chris. Thanks very much.
Tags: Affairs, Foreign, Smith, Stephen