Subjects: Foreign Minister';s address to Parliament
E&OE...........
JOURNALIST:
Prime Minister, [inaudible] Mr Downer will make a statement to the Parliament next week, is this finally, as the Opposition's been demanding, the evidence supporting a case for war?
PRIME MINISTER:
This will be a statement about Iraq's non-compliance with UN resolutions. We haven';t decided to be involved in military conflict, we haven't been asked to be. We think the United Nations should ensure that Iraq complies fully with previous resolutions and Mr Downer's statement appropriately will deal with the issue of non-compliance. It will be open to debate and people from different sides of the Parliament will have an opportunity of talking on it and that doesn't preclude further statements, either by him or by me. We have always said that the matter would be fully debated in Parliament and I hope when Parliament resumes next week Mr Crean will ask me more than just two questions in a fortnight on Iraq, which was the case during the last sitting.
JOURNALIST:
Will there be a motion put before the Parliament about whether or not Australia should go to war?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, because we haven't taken any decision to do that. I mean, there's nothing to move a motion about. We are not in a situation where we've been asked to be involved in military conflict. We hope the situation can be resolved without military conflict. That's everybody's wish. The President is obviously going to put it on the United Nations to match its responsibilities and we support that approach. In those circumstances there's no subject on which to move a motion.
JOURNALIST:
If the UN, though, decides that Iraq has no case to answer, but President Bush decides to go ahead and launch a strike against Iraq and asks Australia to be involved in that, would you support…
PRIME MINISTER:
There are three ifs in that and I just deal in realities as they arise. We haven't been to the UN yet. Let's just deal with things one at a time. I';m not going to speculate on such a sensitive issue as this, I';m not going to speculate about hypothetical situations. The only situation we have in front of us at the moment is Iraqi non-compliance. That should be addressed, that is the issue and that will be the subject on Mr Downer's statement.
JOURNALIST:
But you don';t expect President Bush to go any further in his address to the UN tomorrow.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I don't know exactly what the President's going to say but my expectation is that he will be talking about Iraqi non-compliance and the obligations of the United Nations to deal with that non-compliance.
JOURNALIST:
So wouldn't that mean Mr Downer pretty much just covers those issues again next week?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, Mr Downer is the Foreign Minister of Australia and he has a responsibility to the Australian Parliament to deal with those issues.
Thank you.
[Ends]