What Australian newspapers say on Friday, April 21, 2006

AAP General News (Australia)
04-21-2006
What Australian newspapers say on Friday, April 21, 2006

SYDNEY, April 21 AAP - Australia has again ended up at the feet of the Indonesian leadership
- this time partly because the Howard government, and much of the Australian pubic, misjudged
Indonesian fervour over Papua, The Sydney Morning Herald says in its editorial today.

This is a case of realpolitik as much as anything, the newspaper says.

Australia's trade routes run through Indonesian waters, our border protection depends
on Indonesian cooperation and our regional counter-terrorism strategy relies heavily on
the capacity, and willingness, of Indonesia's security forces to break local terrorist
cells and its courts to prosecute.

At the same time, it is reasonable to expect meaningful change in Papua; when Susilo
Bambang Yudhoyono assumed Indonesia's presidency "he pushed the grinding misery of separatist
conflicts in Aceh and Papua to the top of his agenda", the Herald says.

But Australia's perceived undermining of Indonesian sovereignty in Papua - by granting
protection visas to 42 Papuans - has united Indonesia's political factions.

"The biggest losers in the bilateral row are the long suffering Papuan people," the
Herald says. "While Australia is demonised, the real problem - decades of Indonesian military
abuse and the grossly unfair distribution of Papua's natural wealth - can be ignored."

Papua's best hope, the paper says, still lies in re-engaging Dr Yudhoyono and his promise
of meaningful autonomy for Papua within the Indonesian nation. "That is a cause Australia
can usefully champion," the Herald says.

The depressing sight of mobs running wild through the streets of Honiara, terrifying
the ethnic Chinese population, looting and torching homes and shops and demanding the
resignation of the country's new prime minister, is a reminder to Australians that nation
building is never easy, The Courier Mail says.

"For Australia, this is a setback, but not a reason to give up on our troubled island
neighbour, as some would have it," the paper says.

"A stable Solomons is not only in the best interests of the hundreds of thousands of
people scattered across the nation's many islands, it is obviously, as Prime Minister
John Howard noted yesterday, in our interests too."

The Courier Mail says Australia's decision to deploy more troops to Honiara to restore
order has no doubt averted the Solomons' slide back into anarchy. But it needs to exert
more influence on the country's political culture.

The level of influence of Taiwan in Solomon Islands' affairs should not have been allowed
to happen. "After all, it is Australia, not Taiwan, that carries the cost and risk when
things go wrong in the Solomons, and no doubt we will continue to do the same for many
years," the paper says.

Australian troops and federal police officers are again on the front line in the Solomon
Islands, trying to quell an eruption of rioting, arson and looting, Melbourne's Herald
Sun says today.

"The Herald Sun has no doubt they will acquit themselves magnificently in bringing
the powder-keg situation under control," the editorial says.

"But once the dust settles and the fires subside in Honiara, a much more intractable
problem will remain: how to resolve the tensions that have once again led this Pacific
nation to erupt in an orgy of violence.

The spark for the mob's rampage was Tuesday's surprise appointment of Snyder Rini as
prime minister.

The rioters believed Chinese businessmen, possibly acting on behalf of the Taiwanese
government or other external interests, bribed MPs to elect Mr Rini, the paper says.

Federal Treasurer Peter Costello deserves praise for his prudent handling of all things
fiscal, The Daily Telegraph says this morning.

And today there is special reason to acknowledge Mr Costello's skill and diligence,
the paper says.

For yesterday he announced today is the day Australia becomes debt free.

The Telegraph says this is great news. The elimination of debt - through asset sales
and budgetary restraint - delivers the long term benefit of freeing the economy from the
burden of interest payments and makes it possible to save for the challenges ahead.

So perhaps the budgetary surplus that has already been banked could be used to lower
the tax burden on wage earners.

For the thousands of families struggling to keep ahead of their own repayment schedules,
a substantial tax cut would be a godsend, the Telegraph says.

Peter Costello has raised the spectre of a 1970s-style oil shock causing an inflationary
spiral to put the knockers on genuine tax reform, The Australian says.

But whereas the price hikes 30 years ago were supply driven, today's increases are
the result of rising demand as the growth economies of China and India seek more oil to
fuel their industrial expansion.

As a net exporter of energy, Australia stands to benefit from current developments.

But it has squandered past such windfalls. Unions have been allowed to exploit booms
to demand massive pay rises and shorter working weeks, which seriously hurt the economy
when things turned sour.

This time, The Australian says, the global resources boom looks to be more resilient
than in the past and the brute power of the unions has been largely neutered.

The Australian wonders how much longer Mr Costello and the prime minister can continue
to resist the need for genuine tax reform, especially in the face of growing criticism
from figures such as the Inspector-General Taxation David Vos and Commissioner of Taxation
Michael D'Ascenzo, who complain of the mind-boggling complexity of the Australian tax
system.

Somehow, the Queen has never seemed anything but middle-aged, that she turns 80 today
is something of a shock, The Age says today.

"Suddenly, Her Majesty is an octogenarian," the editorial says.

The ageing process has been cushioned by having the Queen Mother around for all those
years, but since her death at the age of 101 four years ago, the rest of the royal family
have gone up a notch.

"The celebrations of the Queen's 80th are well deserved, and she has earned the plaudits
and great affection in which she is held," The Age says.

"She is the world's second longest-serving monarch - the longest, coming up for 60
years, is the King Bhumipol of Thailand, who is a year younger than the Queen - and there
is no doubting her staying power."

Transparency is one of the best tools for preventing unsuspecting investors from being
ripped off, the Financial Review says today.

"But in the case of financial planning the relationship between fund managers and investment
retailers is so structurally intimate, disclosure alone is not enough," the paper says.

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) takes a feather to conflicts
of interest, it says.

Its typical response is to say this type of conflict must be avoided. But meaningful
action is limited to prosecution or revoking a licence after a fund manager collapses
- when the damage has already been done.

"Canberra needs to give the regulator more explicit power to prohibit certain types
of conflicts - and ASIC must use it," the Review says. "Good though it is - disclosure
alone is not enough."

AAP rj

KEYWORD: EDITORIALS

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