A Study On The Relationship Between Australia And Indonesia Under Paul Keating’s Cabinet

Since the end of the cold war, significant changes occurred in the economic andsecurity situation of the Asia-Pacific region. The changes have had a significantimpact on the relationship between two important regional powers, Australia andIndonesia. In1990s, the Suharto regime, as the long run of Government in Indonesia,began more actively to deal with changes in the world situation. In late1991,Australia’s new Prime Minister Paul Keating made great adjustments on the strategyof Australian diplomacy. Developing the relations between Asia and Australia on thebasis of strengthening the relationship between Indonesia and Australia become oneof strategic focus of Australia. In this period of tenure from December1991to March1996, Keating constantly visited Indonesia, more frequency than the upfrontgovernment. Faced the olive branch Keating offered, Indonesia readily accepted amulti-faceted, multi-level exchanges and cooperation. In the politic aspect, not onlyrelationship and cooperation strengthened between the two governments which hadlunched more dialogues on the human rights, but also the mateship was establishedbetween senior officials from two countries. In the economic aspect, while twocountries worked together to promote Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC)and State-led regional process of economic opening and liberalization of trade, theyendeavored to enhance bilateral trade cooperation which achieved excellent results. Inthe security cooperation, Indonesia had participated the multilateral security dialoguesystem launched by Australia, while deepen military cooperation with Australia,ended up with profound bilateral security agreements. For the people to people andcultural exchanges, cultural and educational cooperation had been strengthened，andthe travels increased between two countries. In addition, as a result of the increasingof visits and communications between two sides on the official and people to peoplelevel, one side know more on the other side later. However, some sensitive areas suchas humanity problems must be faced by both sides. Then the two countries could seekcommon ground while reserving differences to deal with these problems. Finally theymaintained the good situation of bilateral relations in general.