ABC Afternoon Briefing – Greg Jennett

GREG JENNETT: Zed Seselja, welcome back to Afternoon Briefing. It wasn't very long ago that we spoke, but then unexpected developments on your patch, the Pacific and overseas development assistance, this draft security agreement with the Solomon Islands, pretty clear the government is viewing it with deep concern and surprise?

MINISTER SESELJA: Well, we're obviously concerned by the words in the draft agreement, and we're raising those concerns with the Solomon Islands Government in a range of ways. And it comes obviously at a time when we are working very, very closely with the Solomon Islands Government, as we have in the past with RAMSI and now with our deployment to the Solomon Islands, we are working very closely together to keep order within the Solomon Islands. We've responded just in the last day or so to a request from the Solomon Islands Government for more support, to extend that deployment. So working very closely with them, but yes, we do view this draft agreement with a significant degree of concern, and we'll be expressing that to the Solomon Islands Government.

GREG JENNETT: Okay. So you say that you're raising this with the Solomon's Government in a variety of ways. At what levels? I mean, you would expect that the High Commissioner would be talking directly. There'd be levels of escalation above that, too, I imagine.

MINISTER SESELJA: Well, that's already happened. So the [Australian] High Commissioner has spoken to the [Solomon Islands] Prime Minister and to the [Solomon Islands] Foreign Minister and obviously raised the concerns by the Australian Government. I've also had some exchanges with other counterparts in the region who I think also share a number of our concerns. One of the things about the Pacific family and the way we've responded to difficulties, whether it's natural disasters, but particularly some of the security challenges, is we've responded as a Pacific family, and we don't see a role for an authoritarian regime to be obviously coming in a security environment in the region. And so that's something that is very important to Australia, to our interests, but also to the interests of the broader Pacific.

GREG JENNETT: Okay. I'll explore that just a little further in a moment. But on the question of the military extension or the security extension, it's both AFP and Defence Force members. Was that envisaged earlier this week? You were reminding us at that time that it was a temporary form of assistance. Is this a hastily arranged extension in more recent days, in light of these events?

MINISTER SESELJA: No, no, this is a request that was put in, I think, a couple of weeks ago and so there'd been discussions taking place to respond to that request from the Solomon Islands Government. So the request came from the Solomon Islands Government, we've responded favourably to that to extend our deployment there ‘til the end of 2023. We've also agreed to other assistance, including building an eastern border outpost, including providing the Solomon Islands Government with a radio network that has interoperability between the police and emergency services, as well as other support. So there's a significant degree of support we are giving, but no, that's been in train - there's been discussions about that for the last couple of weeks.

GREG JENNETT: Okay. So on the strategic advance that China appears to be making, you say there's no place for a power like that in a Pacific neighbourhood. Does this therefore represent diplomatically the one that got away? I'm wondering just how Australia, with all of its responsibilities in this region, could have been outfoxed, at least in terms of a draft agreement, even if it's never signed?

MINISTER SESELJA: Well, I don't think you should draw that conclusion, as you do say in your question, it is a draft agreement. So there'll obviously be discussions that will be taking place between our government, the Australian Government, and the Solomon Islands Government and amongst Pacific counterparts in the Pacific family. And as I say, and I'll repeat, the Pacific family comes together in these circumstances., we work well together, we don't see the need in a security environment to go beyond that. And I think that it does potentially have implications, and we'll see, I think, significant pushback in the region.

GREG JENNETT: So if that's the case, what do you expect? Is there going to be a solidification of solidarity, unity almost in rejecting this among Pacific Nations which don't always speak with one voice? Do you think this might actually galvanize them?

MINISTER SESELJA: Well, I'm certainly getting that sort of feedback from some of our Pacific neighbours, but of course, there will be further discussions that will take place. We are the security partner of choice, whether it's in the Solomon Islands, whether it's in Fiji, whether it's in PNG and other places in the region, and we have been doing a lot in this space. We haven't just stepped up when it comes to ODA at record levels in the Pacific, around $1.7 billion this year, we've got the Guardian class patrol boats, we opened the BlackRock facility in Fiji recently. I mentioned some of that additional support in the Solomon Islands, and it's been long standing, of course, going back to the long deployment in RAMSI, where we devoted a lot of capital and a lot of support to the people of the Solomon Islands.

GREG JENNETT: Well, exactly, and it's against those investments, endeavours and initiatives that this development is even more intriguing. Do you have any understanding about why and how it came to get to this point?

MINISTER SESELJA: Well, look, obviously, we won't go into all of the discussions, but what I would say is that clearly Solomon Islands, we respect their sovereignty, but we also will respectfully raise our issues and our concerns because we have significant interests in the region. And we are, I would say, more than pulling our weight when it comes to supporting our neighbours. We've supported them through COVID, we support them in security cooperation, we support them with overseas development assistance, and so, yes, we will have those discussions. We'll do it in a respectful way, but we will do it in a way that is very much putting the Australian national interest and the interest of stability in the region at the forefront.

GREG JENNETT: So there are very visible forms of our assistance, military visits, port visits. Are there things that Australians could reasonably expect to flow from this more forms of visible assistance? I mean, there's the invisible stuff, too cables under the sea and development assistance money that goes out, but could we in the immediate future, see a package of extra initiatives that are directly responsive to this draft security agreement?

MINISTER SESELJA: Well, look, I mean, I wouldn't go into that specifically, what I would say is that what we have been doing is putting in place in the Pacific a major focus on the Pacific in our development assistance, in our security arrangements, in infrastructure financing, in disaster relief. We have been on the ground when there's a tsunami in Tonga, when there's unrest in the Solomon Islands, when COVID struck, we've delivered the vaccines. So in every way that we can, we support our neighbours, we do it because it's the right thing to do, but we also do it because we believe it's in our national interest, in the interests of the Pacific region.

GREG JENNETT: Yeah, I guess there'll be a bit more to talk about on this front in the days and weeks ahead. Zed Seselja, thanks again for joining us on Afternoon Briefing.