MIDDLETON: Prime Minister, very good to see you again.
PM: Good to be on the program.
MIDDLETON: This initiative that you have with Malaysia to educate Afghani, or Afghan teachers, what's the thinking?
PM: Well, Malaysia is a moderate Muslim country and regarded with great respect right across the Islamic world. So, when it comes to designing education programs, teacher training programs for Muslim countries with real challenges like Afghanistan, Malaysia has a lot to offer.
Secondly, what we would like to do is partner with our friends in Malaysia through our universities, with their universities, to assist with the funding, that is, bring Afghan principals, educators, education trainers to Malaysia. Use our funding through our universities to assist in their training, send them back to Afghanistan to in turn train more school administrators, more teachers. That is the simple proposal.
MIDDLETON: So, it is designed also I take it, to give Malaysia a real role in a real way in what is going on in Afghanistan at the moment?
PM: Well very much so, but I think for the Government of Malaysia's educators that has been its ambition for some time.
Part of what we are trying to do with our friends in Kuala Lumpur is this, to provide new avenues whereby Australia and Malaysia can work together in the world. Rather than just focussing our efforts on our bilateral relationship, which is in fine working order, it is a good relationship, it is a great relationship, I am sure we will make it better again.
But it is actually taking those existing strengths and applying them to problems within our region and problems beyond our region. And that combination of Australian expertise, Australian funding, Malaysian expertise, and it's great credibility as a mainstream Muslim country, I think it will help the people of Afghanistan.
Because in Afghanistan, if we can assist with the security as we for example are doing in Oruzgan Province, and we have lost troops again recently, tragically. But in the provincial reconstruction effort, can assist in flowing teachers through and education administrators through, to help build the civil society of that part of Afghanistan, it is the first step forward.
MIDDLETON: Looking at Afghanistan further, in the wake of the latest death of an Australian soldier in combat, your Defence Minister Joel Fitzgibbon declared pessimism about the course of the struggle there. Do you share that pessimism?
PM: Well, the Defence Minster have been quite right in, since the period that we formed the Government of Australia at the end of last year, to underline the absolute realism we have got to have about what we are up against in Afghanistan.
This is a very tough challenge and that is why the Defence Minister and myself and the Chief of Defence Force went to the Bucharest conference in March-April this year, with the members of NATO, to map out for the first time, an integrated political and military strategy for the future.
And what we said then was that we wanted to review progress against that strategy each year. So, that is the realism we have tried to inject into the Afghanistan campaign and we will be doing that ourselves.
MIDDLETON: Do you think the struggle against the Taliban can be won without the commitment of more troops as American commanders seem to fear that they don't have enough? What are your experts telling you about the level of troops as far as the war is needed?
PM: Our focus, logically, has been on Oruzgan province and that is where we are. We have an operation in Kandahar and then another at Tarin Kowt.
And our focus has been on what is necessary to secure that part of Afghanistan in partnership with our Dutch allies.
We are doing that, but it has got two arms to it. Again a military strategy, and a political and civil reconstruction strategy. We think we have got the access to work that through in our part of Afghanistan. As for the country at large, that's what I would like to have professionally evaluated in 12 months time.
Because, as I said before, Australia is there for the long haul. But we are not providing a blank cheque.
MIDDLETON: I take it you are still adamant are you that Australia will not be committing any further forces to the struggle in Afghanistan?
PM: There is no basis for any such addition. We of course will evaluate the success of this strategy that the have embraced as a group of nations in Bucharest, after a long debate, because we don't simply want things to be allowed to drift without review. You must have a focussed review. That strategy set some bench marks and that's the evaluation we will be undertaking, hopefully in partnership with others, come March/April next year.
MIDDLETON: You have just emerged from meetings with your Malaysian counterpart. You have described Malaysia as a flourishing democracy. I am wondering how that sits with the allegations around the last election of vote rigging and vote buying and the fact of detention without trial?
PM: Well on the actual operation of the parliamentary elections themselves, remember we've had an unprecedented outcome in these March 2008 elections. Why I said that we have a flourishing democracy in Malaysia is that outcome has been handled peacefully, it's been handled democratically and I think it's a great testament to the people of this country and their institutions that that was able to occur.
There are many people who didn't believe that that could be accommodated peacefully.
And that's why I said what I said about the robust state of the Malaysian democracy.
MIDDLETON: Did you contemplate meeting Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrihim while you were here, and why in the end did you not?
PM: Well, in the first instance it's important to note that the practice in this country back to time immemorial has been when there are visiting Heads of Government, that they do not meet Opposition Members of Parliament or Leaders of Oppositions, that has been the case for a long, long time. And certainly a practice adhered to by my predecessors in the Australian Government.
There's nothing different to what I'm doing to what my predecessors have done. That's the first point.
Second is, in terms of Anwar himself, as he's indicated on the record, no such request for any meetings were made either.
In the past, contact as appropriate has been maintained at other levels, including at the Foreign Minister, Foreign Ministry, level, with Opposition figures, that has been the case in the past and will be the case in the future.
MIDDLETON: You had a seat at the top table this week at the G8 and petrol, fuel prices, of course, were pretty high on the agenda. But, the talk of a blowtorch being applied to OPEC, seems like a pretty dim flame in terms of the outcome there, wasn't it?
PM: Well I seem to think that Dr Nelson was the person who was issuing public calls of that type in relation to the G8 meeting.
The important thing about the G8 meeting was that we had three things on the agenda. One, seeking to begin to force some consensus on the critical challenge of climate change. Two, the immediate challenge of global energy supply, energy security and global oil prices. And three, what to do about food security prices around the world as well.
And the meetings I attended with the 16 largest economies in the world, were well focussed around those three challenges.
On the question of global oil prices, there was a clear discussion about the outcomes of the Jeddah Conference, which was convened by the King of Saudi and by Gordon Brown, and further, I understand the British Prime Minister will be having a similar meeting towards year's end.
On the critical questions of supply, that means greater investment in oil production. Secondly, greater investment in oil refining capacity. And thirdly, greater transparency in oil markets.
These are the three areas where concrete work has to occur. Press releases don't fix that.
MIDDLETON: But it also meant, doesn't it, that relief in the short term for consumers, whether they be in Australia, Malaysia or anywhere else around the world, is quite some way off?
PM: Well let's be blunt about it, the global oil price challenge did not materialise overnight. You've seen global oil prices ratchet up last year significantly, and they have of course gone up steeply again this year.
This has been a problem emerging for some time. And a large part of the global challenge lies in the difficulties in supply. Partly because of OPEC's arrangements. Partly because of possible problems in speculation from lack of market transparency. And partly because you don't have enough in foreign investment flowing into oil production and refining capabilities.
But specifically, where the conference in Jeddah, which brought together oil producers and consumers, established a framework for further work. But it's going to take some time to work through. There is no silver bullet on this. I'm the first one to place that clearly on the record. But at the global level, we still have a programme of work to be done.
MIDDLETON: Finally, climate change, the meeting between the G8 and some of the developing nations ended with pretty much a clear split with the developing nations demanding action via the industrialised world ahead of them and steeper action too.
It does seem, doesn't it, that we haven't really advanced much since the original Rio conference on climate change back in the early 90s. The question is getting more urgent and yet people are simply sticking to their own citadels?
PM: I believe the challenge is becoming more urgent because the science speaks very clearly on this. I don't think anyone is being responsible if they look at the science and say, ‘sorry, not for me buddy' - it's just there, it stares you in the face.
And guess what, it's doesn't readily acknowledge national political boundaries. Climate change goes across the lot. And therefore it affects everybody.
Secondly, some progress was achieved, albeit modest on the part of developed countries, in terms of their commitment to a goal of reducing global greenhouse emissions by 50 per cent - or at least 50 per cent - by 2050.
MIDDLETON: But there's no mechanism for doing it and no agreement on exactly how it should be done?
PM: Sure. And it's the other part of that reference in their communiqué points to where the operational negotiations are happening, which is the Bali road map, the climate change ministers, through until the Copenhagen Conference at the end of next year.
So, at one level, there was from the developed countries a signal that they are prepared to embrace a more ambitious target. That's at one level, and I say, that's modest.
I think where we need, what I describe as a grand bargain or a grand consensus, is for the developing world, who have a clear idea about what developed economies will do. And secondly, then, from the developing world, say to the rest of the international community, here are the actions we can take. And the third part in particular is critical.
What are the technology platforms, what are the market systems, which can give effect to these commitments and targets. They are the elements of a grand bargain or a grand consensus which needs to be struck. We're a long way off it.
But you can either sit back and say, ‘all too hard, sorry, not going to be part of it, say it's all, like Mr Howard used to say, it's a charitable Kyoto plot. Well, it's nothing to do with Kyoto, it's about the science, and whether you're going to act on it.
The Government of Australia under my leadership intend to act. It's going to be tough, it's going to be hard, but it's the right thing to do.
And I contrast that with our political opponents. We are adopting a calm, measured, sensible, responsible approach to this great challenge of climate change. They adopt a new position every 24 hours. Who knows where they stand on this great challenge of our age.
MIDDLETON: Prime Minister, thank you very much for your time.
PM: Good to be with you.