The following Editorial was published in "The Guardian", newspaper of
the Communist Party of Australia in its issue of Wednesday, July 23rd,
2003. Contact address: 65 Campbell Street, Surry Hills. Sydney. 2010
Australia.
Phone: (612) 9212 6855 Fax: (612) 9281 5795.
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Editorial: Cool reception to Howard's sabre rattling in Asia
Howard's visits to the Philippines, Japan and South Korea last week were
by no means a resounding success. His main objective was to pressure the
Governments of these nations to support an aggressive, interventionist
policy against the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea).
Howard's junket was closely followed by British Prime Minister, Tony
Blair who was on a similar mission, to line up Japan and South Korea. It
is of interest that neither Howard nor Blair bothered to visit China or
the Russian Federation which have land borders with North Korea.
Earlier a group of 11 nations had met in Brisbane under the baton of the
United States which, together with the Howard Government, was attempting
to knock together another "coalition of the willing" to "interdict"
North Korean vessels that they "suspected" of carrying missiles, drugs
or even counterfeit money. The nations that attended the Brisbane
meeting were, in a number of cases, less than enthusiastic about
becoming involved in such open piracy.
Howard's visit to the Philippines did win him a joint statement between
the two governments to continue the "war against terrorism" but,
according to media reports, a very chilly personal relationship between
the Philippines President and John Howard was on display. It may well be
that the arrogance of Howard and the Australian Government's clear
intention of telling the Philippines Government how to run its business
was not well received in what is after all, a far more important country
in the Asian region than is Australia.
Commenting on the escape of a "terrorist" suspect from a Philippines
jail at the time of his visit, Howard said that the incident underlined
the "need for steady institution building in many of the countries in
the region". Presumably there is no such need in Australia where Phillip
Ruddock could show these "backward" countries how to run efficient
concentration camps.
Similarly in Japan where the government might have been expected to
enthusiastically sign up to a new war on the Korean Peninsula. The two
sides did no more than back the US demand for multilateral talks between
North Korea, South Korea, the US, Japan and other Asian nations. They
talked vaguely about co-operating in the fight against terrorism. The
proposal to interdict North Korean ships received a cool reception.
There was no mention of a free trade agreement although Japan remains
one of Australia's major trading partners. Rather, Japan intends to
impose a 50 percent tariff on the import of Australian beef.
Trade issues also came up in the Philippines, where the Government
accused Australia of using quarantine restrictions as a means to keep
Philippine bananas off supermarket shelves.
In South Korea the Australian "man of steel" could ring no more out of
the South Korean Government than a commitment to pursue dialogue with
North Korea and the wish to have the problems which have, in fact, been
cooked up by the United States, settled by negotiations. The people of
both South and North Korea are opposed to war and are increasingly
embracing the movement for the reunification of the two states. (See
story page 8.) The fear of peaceful reunification and an independent
Korea is one of the main factors behind the increased aggressiveness
coming from the US and the Australian Governments. That would leave the
US with no excuse to maintain its forces on the peninsula.
Meanwhile The Weekend Australian (July 19-20) has excelled itself in
editorial vitriol. Under the heading "Only monkeys see no evil in N
Korea", the editorial churns out lurid inventions such as "one in 10 of
its citizens has died of starvation since 1995", "The regime holds
200,000 political prisoners and another 400,000 have died in prisons"
and that "North Korea is literally undermining its neighbour with secret
tunnels reportedly penetrating deep into South Korea".
All this is used to justify the "prescient" speeches of George Bush in
which he branded North Korea as one of the three "axis of evil"
countries. But then, Rupert Murdoch who owns The Australian is one of
George Bush's most avid admirers and supporters.
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