PM Transcripts

FOR MEDIA MONDAY,' MAY 5 1980
DEATH OF PRESIDENT TITO
The Government has learned with sadness of the death of
President Tito of Yugoslavia. On behalf of the Government of
Australia and Australians generally, I extend our deep sympathy
to the people of Yugoslavia at this time. We appreciate the
very special nature of the loss that President Tito's death
will mean to them.
President T-ito led his country tirelessly for 35 years and can
be described without exaggeration as the architect of modern
Yugoslavia. At home he secured the unity and support of the country after
the turbulent years of World War II. President Tito's courage
and success in preserving Yugoslavia's independence provided
an example to many, not least to the forces of national
independence which existed elsewhere in Eastern Europe.
In 1943 when the Soviet Union assumed that Yugoslavia could be
absorbed into the then monolithic Soviet bloc, it was
President Tito's successful defiance which preserved his country's
independence. Subsequently he was a staunch critic of the Soviet
invasion of Hungary and Czechoslovakia and more recently of the
Soviet-backed Vietnamese invasion of Kamnpuchea.
By these actions and by his championing of the original principles
of the non-aligned movement, Yugoslavia stands today as a firmly
united and resourceful country fiercely committed to the defence
of its independence and integrity.
Yugoslavia's independence has assumed even greater significance
since the Soviet invasion and occupation of Afghanistan an act
which has shown that the threat of external subjugation is stil1l
very prevalent today as it was when President Tito confronted
it in 1948.
It is thus all the more important that countries make clear
their attachment to Yugoslavia's independence and their firm
hope that Yugoslavia %.. ill continue unimpeded on that same
independent path. Australia for its part unequivocally joins
in that support.