Seven Years Of Foreign Policy Under The Howard Government Kevin Rudd - Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs

Media Statement - 7 March 2003

Australia is now more of a security target in our own region than we need to be

In an address to the Joint Meeting of the Macquarie University Asia Pacific Council and the East Asia Advisory Council in Sydney today, Shadow Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd said Australia under the Howard Government is now less secure in our own region, our own neighbourhood and our own backyard than it was seven years ago.

Mr Rudd said Australia, under the Howard Government, now has less friends and more enemies in the region than it did seven years ago. And Australia, under the Howard Government, is now more of a target in our own region than it otherwise needs to be.

"Labor's approach to Australia's national security rests on three pillars: our alliance with the United States, our commitment to the UN and our policy of comprehensive engagement with Asia," Mr Rudd said.

"After seven years of the Howard Government, two of these three pillars have now collapsed – namely, our role in the United Nations and our policy of regional engagement.

"That's because the Coalition bases its national security policy on one pillar alone – the United States Alliance."

Mr Rudd said for Labor, the Alliance was fundamental to Australia's national security policy - while the Coalition views the Alliance as the totality of Australia's national security policy.

"The foundations of Australia's national security policy under the Coalition are no longer stable, balanced or durable," he said.

Mr Rudd emphasised that Australia's current security policy challenges could not all be laid at the feet of the Howard Government - that would be irrational.

"However, a series of policy pronouncements by the Howard Government has made Australia's national security policy circumstances worse than they needed to be," he said.

"The Government's current policy on Iraq typifies this approach. By advocating a unilateralist policy on Iraq in the absence of a clear mandate from the UN Security Council, the Howard Government is making Australia and Australians more of a security threat than we need to be.

"For John Howard, his comments in the past 24 hours on Iraq demonstrate that, for him, the dice is now cast. A second Security Council resolution for him is now irrelevant. And, under him, Australia is now going to war."