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Morrison-Joko meeting called off before Australian submarines announcement
By Anthony Galloway and Chris Barrett
September 17, 2021 — 5.22pmPrime Minister Scott Morrison’s plan to stop off in Jakarta on the way back from Washington next week was cancelled after President Joko Widodo opted to instead visit provinces outside the capital, while Indonesia reacts with alarm to Australia’s plan to arm itself with nuclear-propelled submarines.
Mr Morrison originally planned to visit Indonesia’s President on the way back from Washington after having his first one-on-one meeting with United States President Joe Biden. But when Australian officials went to confirm the timing of a Jakarta visit, days before the announcement Australia would acquire nuclear-powered submarines, the Indonesian government said Mr Joko was unavailable as he would not be in the capital.
Indonesia’s foreign ministry said on Friday that it had taken note of Australia’s decision to use American technology to acquire eight nuclear-powered submarines and stressed “Indonesia is deeply concerned over the continuing arms race and power projection in the region”.
The Australian government does not believe the failure of the two leaders to meet in person has anything to do with the country’s unease over the submarine plan because the decision not to go to Jakarta was made before the announcement. Diplomatic relations between Canberra and Jakarta have been labelled their best in decades and it was only last week that Defence Minister Peter Dutton and Foreign Minister Marise Payne made the Indonesian capital their first stop on an overseas trip which has taken in India, South Korea and the US.
But Indonesia has maintained healthy ties with China, and Beijing this year sent millions of Chinese-made COVID-19 vaccines to the country.
Mr Morrison spoke with Mr Joko this week by phone about the submarine development. He has also called Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, outgoing Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga and India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi in recent days. While Indonesia has expressed alarm about the proposal, Singapore – which already hosts American nuclear-powered submarines – is said to be comfortable with the move.
Former Labor prime minister Kevin Rudd, whose government first adopted the policy of acquiring a new fleet of submarines in 2009, has voiced scepticism over the move, saying the submarine replacement program had “ground to a halt” over the past eight years.
“The result: not a single keel laid, up to $4 billion wasted, and the deep alienation of our Japanese and French strategic partners,” Mr Rudd said in an opinion piece for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.
“It has been an essay in financial waste, national security incompetence and egregious foreign policy mismanagement.”
Australia, the US and Britain on Thursday announced a historic new partnership, known as AUKUS, which will allow Canberra to access American technology to build a fleet of at least eight nuclear-powered submarines and pursue long-range hypersonic missile technology and undersea drones.
The three-way security pact comes in the face of China’s escalating militarisation of the South China Sea and has angered Beijing, which said the agreement “seriously undermines regional peace and stability and intensified the arms race”.
Mr Morrison will be in Washington between Monday and Saturday next week for the first leaders’ summit of the Quad grouping of countries, which comprises Australia, the US, Japan and India.
The trip will follow Mr Dutton and Senator Payne’s visit to Washington this week for the annual Australia-US Ministerial consultations, where they agreed with their US counterparts to explore an increase in the number of US troops rotating through northern Australia and more bilateral military exercises. They also floated the possibility of a naval base in Australia which could host a combined submarine and surface fleet.
Morrison-Joko meeting called off before Australian submarines announcement
Indonesia was alarmed by Australia’s plan to arm itself with nuclear-propelled submarines, but the leaders will not meet next week as Scott Morrison had hoped.
