Australia-Bangladesh relations

The meeting was jointly organised by the Chairman of the Group, Hon. Dr. Andrew Laming M.P. and the Bangladesh High Commissioner to Australia, Ashraf ud-Doula.

The primary purpose of the meeting is to engage actively the Australian Members of Parliament (both Senators and Members of the House of Representatives) in strengthening and widening bilateral relations between the two Commonwealth countries.

It is noted that Australia is the first developed country to accord recognition to Bangladesh on 31st January, 1972, immediately after independence and sent a Bangla-language speaking diplomat as its first High Commissioner to Bangladesh. Australia's role during the Liberation War had been overwhelmingly supportive in both diplomatic and material terms and was much appreciated by people of Bangladesh during their difficult days.

Australia's brief profile
No country took formal possession of Australia until 1770, when an English Naval Captain James Cook charted the east coast and claimed it for Britain. The first settlement was a British penal colony, established on 26th January, 1788 in Sydney. After Britain lost America in 1783, it sent the convicts to Australia until the middle of the 19th century. It is estimated that about 160,000 British convicts were sent to Australia.

Australia is a country with its history and geography in sharp contrast. While historically its people are tied with Britain in their way of life, the country is located in Asia Pacific region. Many Australians perceive the separation from "motherland" Britain as a "tyranny of distance".

Its nearest neighbours to the north are Indonesia, Papua New Guinea and East Timor. Australia is very conscious that its danger to security emanates from Asia. It is an "odd man" out in Asia with its political institutions rooted in the British mould and majority of its people are of British origin (about 66%).

Australia's head of the state is the Queen of England and the Governor General acts as the representative of the Queen and is the ceremonial head. The Prime Minister is the chief executive and John Winston Howard (66) has been the Prime Minister since 1996. Elections are held every three years.

The Howard government is a coalition of Liberal (conservative) Party with the National Party (rural-based party), elected during the last election in October 2004. The coalition secured majority of seats in both houses of Parliament -- Senate and House of Representatives. The Labour Party is the mainstream opposition in the Parliament and they held the power from 1983 to 1996.

Changing priority
Australia has been traditionally tied with Britain and the US. It is a "Western" country and is rich. It largely skipped its relations with Asia in earlier times. Furthermore until early 70s, Australia pursued "White Policy" in its immigration intake. They even were not interested in people from Southern Europe before the Second World War, because their hair was dark. They preferred people from northern Europe to migrate to Australia.

During the 50s , Australia's "White Policy" drew sharp criticism from Asia's newly-independent countries and in response, Australia was one of the founding nations of the Colombo Plan, under which Australia provided assistance to Asian countries, including receiving Asian students and government officials for training in Australia. The purpose was to mollify the concerns of Asian countries. Australia opened the doors for people of all countries after Gough Whitlam, Labour Prime Minister, won the election in 1972. It has been a multicultural country since then.

During the early 70s, Australia had to adjust its economic relations after Britain joined the European Union in 1973. Suddenly it found cut off economically from "its mother" who was involved in European economy, rather in economic ties with former colonies.

Australia had to turn its attention for economic survival to South East and North Asian countries. Currently more than 60 percent of its exports go to Asian countries. In recent years, China and Australia have increased their economic cooperation including trade, amounting to hundreds of billions of dollars. Australia's export to China consists of minerals, oil, gas and iron ore. Australia now is considering export of uranium to China, provided it is not used in nuclear weapons.

Focus on South Asia
Since 2002, Australia has focused to deepen its relations with countries of South Asia. It is partly because India is emerging as a major industrial power and partly because it seeks cooperation from South Asian countries to combat terrorism (in 2002, 80 Australians were killed in a bomb explosion at Bali, Indonesia).

The Prime Minister of Australia is reported to be visiting India in November to expand and consolidate its relations with India. While it is concentrating its relations with India, it has been also interested to strengthen its relations with the countries of South Asia including Bangladesh and Pakistan. A few months ago, President General Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan visited Canberra and received a red carpet treatment, not ordinarily given to leaders of South Asia by Australia.

Bilateral relations with Bangladesh
Australia has been a modest source of aid for Bangladesh and is a member of the Bangladesh Aid Group. It contributes its aid as a global programme and the aid is focussed on community programmes. In 2004, bilateral aid from Australia stood at US$45 million. Australia contributed about US$ 10 million over four years to a population and health project of International Development Association (IDA).

Bilateral trade has been growing in recent years. In 2002-03, Australian exports stood at US$220 million, while those of Bangladesh only US$36.71 million, according the Export Promotion Bureau of government of Bangladesh.

The potential of bilateral trade and economic opportunities between the two countries has yet to be realised. The failure of private sectors of both countries in penetrating each other's market can be best ascribed at least partly to the weak information base on each other. Furthermore no national airline flies between the two countries.

Meeting of the Australia-Bangladesh Parliamentary Group
In this context, it has been appropriate that the first meeting of the Australia-Bangladesh Parliamentary Group was held on 16th August.

The meeting was held under the Chairmanship of dynamic and energetic Dr. Andrew Laming, MP (39) who has also earned MBA from Harvard University. From clearing landmines in Afghanistan, to delicate eye operations in remote Australia, Andrew Laming has brought breadth of experience to his role as Member of Parliament from the outskirts of Brisbane. As a Red Cross volunteer, he had visited Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Cuba and Madagascar.

It appears that Dr. Andrew Laming has taken seriously his job as the Chairman of the Australia-Bangladesh Parliamentary Group and assured that he would leave no stone unturned to deepen relations with Bangladesh.

From Bangladesh side, the officers of the Bangladesh High Commission and a few Australian-Bangladeshi-born academics from Melbourne, Adelaide and Canberra were present at the invitation of the Bangladesh High Commissioner.

Charles Stuart, former Australian High Commissioner to Bangladesh (1996-99) and Ross Hitt (who lived in Dhaka for about six years), currently the Managing Director of the Snowy Mountain Engineering Corporation (SMEC) also attended the meeting at the request of the Bangladesh High Commissioner.

At the beginning, Dr. Laming welcomed the participants of the meeting and declared its purpose. Thereafter Bangladesh High Commissioner Ashraf ud-Doula , in a brief speech, among others, provided a very broad profile on the improved socio-economic indicators of Bangladesh.

He also has emphasised that Bangladesh is a multi-ethnic and multi-religious country. Bangladesh has been and will continue to be a moderate and tolerant Muslim majority country. He indicated that there has been a quiet revolution in women's empowerment in the country through micro-credit financing facilities and employment opportunities in ready-made garment industries.

He invited the members of Australian Parliament to visit Bangladesh and meet their counterparts and see for themselves the socio-economic conditions prevailing in Bangladesh.

Charles Stuart, former Australian High Commissioner to Bangladesh, (now retired) said that, Bangladesh's economic progress and political stability had always been one of the priorities of Australia's foreign policy. He emphasised that there existed a good market for Australia to sell goods to Bangladesh as the middle class had been rising in the country more than the total population of Australia (20 million). Australia's private sector should be pro-active to capture the market.

The chief of the Snowy Mountain Engineering Corporation, Ross Hitt, provided a picture of safe environment for Australian private sectors to invest in the country. He even highlighted the secure atmosphere in the Chittagong Hill Tracts where there exists a great opportunity for investment in food-processing industries.

The two Australian speakers who have had the first-hand experience in Bangladesh had projected a very good profile for the country to the Australian members of parliament. Their view has created a positive image of Bangladesh in the eyes of the participants of the meeting.

Conclusion
The initiative taken by Dr. Laming, MP and the Bangladesh High Commissioner to Australia is commendable.

The participant-members of the Australian Parliament have realised that there is more to Bangladesh than the stereotyped negative image of the country, reported often in the local media.

Although the result may not be immediately felt, it seems that a new phase of cooperative and productive relations between the two countries has ushered in to the mutual benefit of both countries. The momentum created out of the meeting of Australia-Bangladesh Parliamentary Group needs to be vigorously pursued and nurtured on continuing basis at both ends.

Barrister Harun ur Rashid is a former Bangladesh Ambassador to the UN, Geneva.