Read more FIVE EYES ISSUES
Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne says there will be no loss of respect if a Five Eyes country chooses against using the alliance to tackle issues which confront liberal democracies.
Payne and New Zealand Foreign Minister Nanaia Mahuta held their first face-to-face meeting in Wellington yesterday.
The meeting came during a week when New Zealand’s wariness to use the Five Eyes intelligence-sharing arrangement beyond its traditional purpose had stirred controversy across the Tasman.
There were plenty of thorny trans-Tasman issues on the agenda. The foreign ministers, at a joint press conference after their meeting, faced questions on Australia’s deportations of criminal ‘‘trash’’ across the ditch, its cancelling of claimed Isis terrorist
Suhayra Aden’s citizenship, and New Zealand’s softer stance on China.
‘‘Australia takes the concerns that New Zealand raises very seriously ... We will work through those issues, in the spirit of important and deep bilateral relationship,’’ Payne said, referring to New Zealand’s protest at Australia stripping Aden’s citizenship.
Payne’s trip came days after
Mahuta gave a hallmark speech about New Zealand’s relationship with China, after which she told reporters New Zealand was ‘‘uncomfortable’’ with expanding the remit of the Five Eyes intelligencesharing arrangement.
Her comments stirred up speculation in Australia and the United Kingdom that New Zealand’s commitment to the intelligence-sharing arrangement
was waning, at a time when the alliance was increasingly seen by some countries as a broader diplomatic tool to combat China’s increasing international influence. The Sydney Morning Herald reported Australian officials were surprised by Mahuta’s comments.
‘‘A lot of issues with which we deal, are dealt with . . . in the shadows, but not all, and some have been able to be dealt with openly and publicly through the Five Eye’s process, because we do share, as liberal democracies, common values and approaches to many of the international issues,’’ Payne said.
‘‘Now my view is that countries will choose to address issues of concerns in whichever forum they themselves determine appropriate and consistent with their respective national interest. But our respect for each other, Australian, the United States, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and Canada, is enduring and continuing, and one which we particularly in Australia value enormously.’’ Payne said she had a ‘‘constructive’’ discussion with Mahuta about Aden, the claimed Isis terrorist and former dualnational of both Australia and New Zealand. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern in February lambasted Australia for revoking Aden’s citizenship, after she travelled to Syria to join Isis.
Aden and her two young children, who were detained in Turkey in February, could be deported to New Zealand despite living most of her life in Australia.
‘‘I want to say very clearly that, regardless of the steps that have been taken in this case to date, both New Zealand and Australia acknowledge that it now does have a number of complexities,’’ Payne said.
‘‘We are working through those issues in the spirit of our bilateral relationship, particularly in relation to children, and they’re matters upon which we will continue to work together.’’
Payne declined to speak on New Zealand’s relationship with China.