PM: Today Australia and Indonesia took our strong relationship to a new level with annual meetings between leaders, foreign ministers and defence ministers, closer cooperation on people-smuggling and terrorism and closer economic and trade ties.
I would like to welcome the President of Indonesia to Australia, welcome him to Canberra, welcome him to Parliament House.
We have in President Yudhoyono a great leader of his country, also a great friend of Australia.
Australia's relationship with Indonesia forms a vital part of Australia's international engagement. Indonesia is our close neighbour. It is a country of 231 million people. It is the most populous Muslim country in the world. It is the world's third largest democracy. It is a key player in our region and a driving force behind ASEAN.
Indonesia's is a vibrant and growing economy. We share with Indonesia the common future of our own region, its stability and its prosperity and, together with Indonesia, Australia works now globally through the G20 and on global challenges like climate change.
Indonesia in recent times has gone through an historic transformation. Indonesia is now a vibrant democracy, living proof that Islam and democracy can live happily side by side.
For us in Australia, Indonesia is a major partner for our future in the region and the world at large.
Much of the credit for the transformation of Indonesia in recent times, I believe, should go to President Yudhoyono himself. His leadership in consolidating Indonesia's democracy has been strong. He has taken his country to higher levels of economic growth, notwithstanding the challenges of the global financial crisis.
He has also played a critical role in strengthening the bilateral relationship between our two countries, including the most difficult times from the Bali bombings on, his leadership in dealing with the impact of the tsunami on his own shores.
And in recognition of his role in the development of Indonesia's democracy, in recognition of his role also in cooperation with Australia in dealing with such tragedies as the Bali bombing, it was, of course, with great pleasure that Australia accorded him membership as an honorary member of the Order of Australia yesterday.
This historic visit symbolises the breadth and depth of our relationship. President Yudhoyono has brought with him some 12 ministers, six governors from the various provincial governments of Indonesia and three members of Parliament and, of course, representatives from a large number of Indonesian government agencies and boards.
Later today he will address the Australian Parliament and in so doing he will only be the fifth global leader to be invited to that podium, that podium of our Australian democracy.
The President and I have had excellent discussions this morning across a vast range of areas. We began these discussions informally last night at the Lodge, with the President, myself, with his wife and my wife Therese and with our foreign policy advisors, a long, detailed, intimate discussion about the challenges we face for the future.
We've continued that more formally this morning and then most recently with the various members of our cabinets.
We've agreed to upgrade our relationship to become one of a comprehensive strategic partnership. We've resolved, as I noted before, that we will meet annually, either in Australia, in Indonesia, at head of government level. We've also resolved that our foreign and defence ministers will meet each year on a two-plus-two basis, as we currently do with our closest partner, the United States.
We've agreed that we will establish and Australia-Indonesia leadership dialogue to promote greater people-to-people cooperation between our two countries, as we also currently have with the United States.
Furthermore, there have been a number of other significant steps that we have initiated today in our bilateral relationship. We've agreed to an arrangement on consular notification and assistance and we look forward to discussions on a possible transfer of sentenced prisoners framework.
Also, our officials yesterday signed an implementation framework on people-smuggling and trafficking in persons. This will enhance and intensify our cooperation on dealing with this complex regional and global challenge.
Also, we have enhanced our cooperation in the dismantling of terrorist networks and I would congratulate again the Indonesian authorities on their excellent work in the last 24 hours in dealing with terrorist networks within their own country. Terrorism is a challenge for both our countries, at home, in the region, and abroad more extensively.
Furthermore, as we've indicated today, we will work even more closely in our cooperation through the G20 to lay the foundations for a sustainable global economic framework for the future.
We've also decided to enhance our cooperation in the area of climate change, as we are doing bilaterally with each other at the moment through REDD demonstration projects but also more broadly through the ongoing international negotiations.
Finally, we spent a long time discussing the future of our region's architecture and how we build the future of the Asia-Pacific region in a stable and prosperous way - how do we make sure that our region remains stable and prosperous in the future and that we safeguard the security which has been so hard-won and hard-fought in decades past and build a prosperous and stable future for all our peoples.
And Australia and Indonesia will continue to work closely on the challenges of the future development of our region's architecture in the period ahead.
Mr President, you are indeed a welcome guest in Australia. We come together as friends, as neighbours, as partners, and I've got to say, at a personal level, a relationship which I enjoy, a relationship which I have placed enormous trust in in recent times and a relationship which I'm sure will continue into the future.
I invite you now, Mr President, to make some remarks of your own.
DR YUDHOYONO: Thank you, Mr Prime Minister. Allow me to speak in Bahasa Indonesia.
DR YUDHOYONO: [In Bahasa Indonesia]
INTERPRETER: Thank you very much. This is my second visit to Australia as President of Indonesia and I want to thank Prime Minister Rudd for his invitation and I want to thank him for the warm reception and also for the excellent program that has been arranged for me.
My purpose in visiting Australia is to continue the excellent cooperation that are already underway and to seek new opportunities to expand our relations.
DR YUDHOYONO: [In Bahasa Indonesia]
INTERPRETER: The partnership and cooperation between Indonesia and Australia are progressing very solidly. Some examples I can cite are that on bilateral and regional and international forums, we are constantly cooperating closely. For example, on the issue of climate change, we are cooperating closely and also on the issue of dealing with the global financial crisis, as well as efforts to evolve the regional architecture.
DR YUDHOYONO: [In Bahasa Indonesia]
INTERPRETER: During our talks today, we agreed to expand cooperation on four major areas, one is on political law and security. And under this area, we are committed to expand cooperation on law enforcement, on the fight against terrorism, on military-to-military cooperation and in fighting trans-national crimes, including people-to-people smuggling.
DR YUDHOYONO: [In Bahasa Indonesia]
INTERPRETER: In the economic area, we agree to expand cooperation in the areas of trade, investment, food and agriculture, energy and other economic activities.
DR YUDHOYONO: [In Bahasa Indonesia]
INTERPRETER: In terms of social cooperation, we agreed to also expand cooperation on education, on health, on tourism, on youth and sport and other things that would intensify people-to-people contacts which would be the basis of our solid partnership.
DR YUDHOYONO: [In Bahasa Indonesia]
INTERPRETER: A key part of our discussion was also on forest management and this is a good cooperation, bilateral, between us, including in addressing natural disasters where there is a framework of cooperation already between us.
DR YUDHOYONO: [In Bahasa Indonesia]
INTERPRETER: On this visit, I have taken a number of Ministers with me, but also six Governors from Indonesia's provinces and it is my hope that there will be increased cooperation between the provinces of Indonesia, in the eastern part of Indonesia, and the states of Australia for mutual benefit.
DR YUDHOYONO: [In Bahasa Indonesia]
INTERPRETER: The relationship between Indonesia and Australia is solid and strong but we need much more opportunities to expand and upgrade this relationship. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and I share the same commitment to maintain and improve this relationship while exploring new opportunities, while also managing the existing relationship.
DR YUDHOYONO: [In Bahasa Indonesia]
INTERPRETER: I want to express in this forum my deep appreciation to Prime Minister Kevin Rudd who has been my very close friend in addressing a number of issues in the G20 forums, in APEC and in the East Asian Summit and other international forums, to find common solutions to regional issues and international issues.
DR YUDHOYONO: [In Bahasa Indonesia]
INTERPRETER: That is all I have to say and I wish to stress again that we now have an historic opportunity to improve and elevate relations between Indonesia and Australia, to seek new opportunities and to resolve issues of wider concern. Thank you very much.
PM: [In Bahasa Indonesia]
PM: Now, we're going to have some questions from the media, from the Australian media and from the Indonesian media. Baba President, some have asked what gift I've given you. I would just like to confirm that I have presented to the President an Australian-made acoustic guitar. The President sings well, he writes music and he writes his own lyrics. In all three departments, he's vastly superior to myself and I hope he enjoys this Australian acoustic guitar which has his initials now inscribed on the side.
Now, over to the Australian media, and then to the Indonesian media.
JOURNALIST: Mr President, Andrew Probyn from The West Australian newspaper, and welcome to Canberra. What is the extent of the new arrangements regarding the enhanced cooperation between Australia and Indonesia combating people smuggling?
Does it go to the processing and resettlement of asylum seekers in Indonesia as you wanted, and have you been asked to play a bigger role in intercepting boats?
And thirdly, does this necessarily mean that Indonesia needs more funds to handle its new responsibilities?
DR YUDHOYONO: [In Bahasa Indonesia]
INTERPRETER: The handling of the boat people issue is very complex issue. It relates to matters that are relating to the law, to security, and to humanitarian issues, and that is why we need to coordinate and cooperate very closely on handling this issue.
Australia as a destination country and Indonesia as a transit country cannot resolve this issue by ourselves. Every country must be on board on this - the origin country, the transit country, and destination country, and also international institutions. They all have to cooperate in dealing with this, and don't forget we already have a framework of cooperation, what is known as the Bali process, which Indonesia and Australia initiated.
And while we both promote this regional and international cooperation, we have also among ourselves bilaterally worked out a framework, a mechanism to deal with this issue in a practical way so that we can deal with it also in a more effective way, and this framework would include arrangements on temporary transit in Indonesia, and how they would be relocated in the process, and other issues.
Clearly, what we need to do is, we need to keep improving this mechanism. We need to make it more effective and we will always continue to discuss the technical aspects of how this cooperation is going to be pursued and improved.
PM: Thank you, Mr President. Now we have a representative from the Indonesian media.
JOURNALIST: OK. To Mr Prime Minister, Indonesian police yesterday again successfully, (inaudible) terrorists, and it proved that they are quite professional and expert (inaudible). In this context, can we Australia not to open (inaudible)
PM: First of all, can I say to the Indonesian authorities through the President, President Yudhoyono, how much we value their work on the ground in combating terrorism. This has been a very professional operation by the Indonesian security forces, and it comes on the top of other successful operations in recent times.
This is difficult work; it is hard work; it is dangerous work, and I would congratulate those Indonesian security agencies which have been engaged in it.
The breakthroughs which Indonesia has made in undermining various terrorist networks have been significant. Our own law enforcement agencies, our own security agencies, have worked in close partnership with our Indonesian friends on it. Therefore we must also be mindful of the fact that the challenge of terrorism continues into the future.
As for the current status of Australian travel warnings, these are assessed independently by agencies of the Australian Government. They have been done so in the past. They'll continue to be executed in that way in the future, and they will always be mindful of changes in the security circumstances in the future.
The Australian Government at a political level does not interfere with those independent assessments undertaken by our professional agencies.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, I wonder if I may go to a domestic matter. Shortly before this press conference we saw the quite extraordinary spectacle of five of your senior cabinet ministers detailing areas where key pieces of legislation are being blocked in the Senate, which raises, I think, the question, is your Government now paralysed, and if you, assuming you cannot break the deadlock in the Senate, don't you have a responsibility, really, to go to the people and seek a fresh mandate?
PM: Can I say this - that if Mr Abbott blocks the Government's paid parental leave scheme in the Senate he'll be punishing young families just to make a political point. Can I say more broadly if Mr Abbott continues to block key measures of the government to help young families and families more broadly just to make a political point, then this may be part of a negative political strategy on his own part, but does nothing to help families, does nothing to help solve real problems on the ground.
I would urge Mr Abbott to take a more constructive approach, but again, as I said before, if Mr Abbott blocks this critical measure of paid parental leave in the Senate just to make a political point, the people who will suffer from this are working families - and they will suffer from it straight away.
Now, from Indonesia.
JOURNALIST: My question is for the Prime Minister. In our effort to combat corruption in our country, sometimes, the challenge is extradition issues. I was wondering if the extradition is something that is discussed with the Indonesian leaders here, and then how far do you see the kind of assistance will be provided by the Australian Government to deal with this for Indonesian domestic process?
PM: Thank you for the question. My understanding is that our foreign ministers have spent a long time working through a range of extradition matters over a period of time. I cannot update you on the specific detail of any individual matter. I'm sure the foreign ministers would be able to do so if you put the question to them.
Can I say, secondly, that when it comes to helping our friends in Indonesia deal with their own law enforcement responsibilities, we always seek to take a positive and constructive approach. These are challenges which Indonesia faces from time to time. These are challenges which Australia faces, and, therefore, relying upon appropriate international legal arrangements to assist our law enforcement agencies is something all of our countries need.
On the details, though, that you may have in mind in terms of any particular cases, I suggest you address those questions to our respective foreign ministers.
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much for attending this press conference. I conclude where I began by saying to the President off Indonesia and to all of our friends visiting from Indonesian that you are truly welcome guests here in Australia.
Thank you.