Fraser's claims rejected
By Foreign affairs writer Robert Garran
16sep00
AUSTRALIA'S ambassador to Jakarta
in 1975, Richard Woolcott, yesterday
rejected claims by former prime
minister Malcolm Fraser that
Department of Foreign Affairs
bureaucrats failed to tell him of
Indonesian plans to invade East
Timor.
Responding to the release this week
of the department's 1974-76 Timor
papers, Mr Fraser said he had been
pressured by the department to send
a message to Indonesian president
Suharto to lock him into their policy
towards East Timor, a claim disputed
by Mr Woolcott.
"I was in Jakarta at the time and was simply the recipient of the message," Mr Woolcott said yesterday.
"When I sought interpretation of it from the prime minister, I was informed that the prime minister's words were self-standing and were not to be interpreted by the ambassador.
"I would be surprised if a message of that nature, which was in fact questioned, would not have been based on proper departmental briefing, even during the period of the caretaker government," he said.
Mr Fraser had been appointed caretaker prime minister after the November 11 dismissal of the Whitlam government, ahead of a general election on December 13.
The Timor documents show Mr Woolcott was directed on November 20 to convey a message to Mr Suharto "indicating the great importance which Mr Fraser attaches to Australia's relations with Indonesia".
"The prime minister wants you to say that he recognises the need for Indonesia to have an appropriate solution for the problem of Portuguese Timor," Mr Woolcott was told.
Five days later, he reported he had called on Mr Suharto to deliver Mr Fraser's message.
To preserve secrecy, as requested by Mr Fraser, he had delivered the message to the president at his home.
Mr Suharto had asked Mr Woolcott to amplify the comment that Indonesia needed an "appropriate solution" of the Timor question.
Mr Woolcott replied he had not had a chance to discuss this with the prime minister but he assumed he had in mind a solution that "accommodated Indonesia's policy interests".