PM: I'm here with Stephen Smith at the conclusion of the meetings today about the future strategy in Afghanistan, and the meeting today has been an important meeting for Afghanistan and for Australia.
48 countries have met to discuss the future strategy in Afghanistan. Now, previously we had agreed that we would work towards having Afghan national security forces in the lead in security in Afghanistan by 2014. Today, we have agreed to launch the transition process for security leadership in 2011, and that would be occurring in selected districts and places in Afghanistan.
This means that we have pressed the political start button on transition. As I've said before, transition will be a gradual process. It will happen place by place. There will be no one transition day, and transition will be conditions-based.
It's important that when we begin the process of transition in an area in Afghanistan we are confident that the Afghan local forces can take the security leadership and sustain that security leadership. We should not transition out only to have to transition back in later.
There will be a rigorous process of assessment to determine where transition can start, in which particular areas. There will be an assessment of the capabilities of local Afghan forces, of the security environment and local governments, and as transition occurs, ISAF, the International Security Assistance Force, will remain assisting.
A joint ISAF-Afghan board has been established to guide the transition process, and of course we will be consulted on and work with transition in our area of Uruzgan province. We will make recommendations in relation to our own area of work.
Our mission is in Uruzgan, and Uruzgan province will not be among the provinces and districts expected to start the transition process early next year. A date for transition in Uruzgan has not been set. However, we do believe we are on target to complete the training of the Afghan National army in Uruzgan in 2-4 years.
President Obama said today at the meeting that training is the ticket to transition, and that's exactly what Australia is doing. In Uruzgan province we are training the 4th Brigade of the Afghan National Army so that they can take security leadership in that province, and we have made a recent commitment of 20 trainers to the Afghan National Artillery School, the kind of additional training capability that is being sought.
I welcome today the commitment from NATO partners that Afghanistan will be the subject of an enduring partnership and commitment. As I said in our parliamentary debate, we will not abandon Afghanistan, so even after security leadership has moved there will be a continuing role for Australia in Afghanistan to the end of the decade at least. Of course, the form of that continuing role will vary. We will be engaged in support and in civilian aid works.
I particularly welcome this long-term partnership declaration by NATO about Afghanistan. We also discussed today at the meeting the reconciliation attempts in Afghanistan, and leaders agreed that these reconciliation endeavours needed to be Afghan-led and could involve those members of the insurgency who renounce violence, cut their links to terrorist groups and accept the Afghan constitution.
We welcomed efforts by the Afghan Government to improve governance and delivery of services to its people. We recognise that corruption remains a major challenge to be addressed, and we welcome President Karzai's commitment to addressing this major challenge.
We also recognise the challenge of addressing the cross-border movement of insurgents between Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Earlier today, at the meeting, we did hear reports from General Petraeus, from the chief civilian representative, Mark Sedwill, and the reports we received from them and also the words of President Karzai fitted in with our cautious optimism that progress is being made. We are making progress in fighting the insurgency. We are making progress in training Afghan national forces, and we are making progress in improving governance. But we know this progress is fragile, and will, from time to time, be subject to reversals in some areas. To quote General Petraeus from his report to the meeting, 'nothing in Afghanistan is easy.'
My message to the summit was that we needed to be clear - clear as we left the summit and clear with our people, with the people, the 48 leaders around the table represented. We needed to be clear with them why we are in Afghanistan. We are there to prevent it becoming, again, a safe haven for terrorists.
We need to be clear that progress is being made and that we are cautiously optimistic about the future.
We need to explain to people that we are very clear on what our mission is, and we need to explain that we now have a clear transition strategy and that our commitment to Afghanistan will endure beyond security leadership changing to Afghan local forces.
I'm very happy to take any questions.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, in your address this morning (inaudible) can you give us an idea of what you said to the other leaders around the table, and whether you think it was well received?
PM: I spoke to the other leaders around the table about Australia's commitment in Afghanistan. We are, of course, the largest non-NATO contributor in Afghanistan. I spoke about our parliamentary debate and indicated that as Prime Minister I had said to our parliament and through our parliament to the Australian people that we would be involved in Afghanistan. We would continue our training mission there. We would see security leadership move place by place on a conditions basis. We would stay engaged in Afghanistan until the end of the decade at least. That is, we would see ourselves still engaged after security leadership had transitioned to Afghan local forces, and that I had said to our parliament that the creation of a stable democracy in Afghanistan would be the work of a generation of the Afghan people.
I spoke about the need to be frank and clear about these things with our own people and with people represented by other leaders around the table. I also welcomed the strategy emerging from the meeting - the start of transition in early 2011 and that transition would be conditions-based, not calendar-based.
I also welcomed the fact that it is the 10-year anniversary of a specific UN Security Council resolution on women. We know that in times of violence it is often women who bear the brunt, and I welcomed the NATO ISAF endorsement of that resolution.
JOURNALIST: You say that General Petraeus gave an assessment of how progress is being made on the ground in Afghanistan. Can you give us a bit more information on why the leaders are so confident that progress is enough to have a 2014 deadline?
PM: Well, I've had the opportunity to be briefed by General Petraeus on two earlier occasions, once here yesterday and once when I was in Afghanistan myself, and what he said to the meeting this morning mirrored those briefings I've had from him in the past. He talks about those areas in Afghanistan where security is being extended, where people are now more free to go about their daily business, the daily routines of life. He talked about his plans to further extend those bubbles of security, the progress that is being made there, so whilst General Petraeus was frank - this work is not easy - he did point to progress that is being made on the ground.
In our own province of Uruzgan, our own Defence Force advises me that progress is being made on the ground, so, for example, in Uruzgan where we work, in Tarin Kowt, you do see people being able to go about daily life, including the local bazaar being open and people being able to engage in trade and commerce and shop and those kind of daily life activities because the security situation has improved.
JOURNALIST: Mr Rasmussen, he talked about more trainers being committed. Are any of those trainers going to come from Australia at all?
PM: Well, we have already responded to requests for additional trainers. I spoke, for example, about our response to the request for artillery trainers, and of course the essence of what we are doing is training. That is, the work that we are doing in Uruzgan, we are training the 4th Brigade of the Afghan National Army.
We, of course, have increased our contribution to Afghanistan by 40 per cent in the last 18 months, so we have stepped up.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, going to what you said about not wanting to go back in when we go out, how much risk is there, after having conversations with leaders here, of this process of transition falling victim to the political calendar of some of the bigger players around the table, and I'm thinking particularly the US presidential elections? Is there a risk, or how much risk is there, of pressure being applied to withdraw more quickly to fit in with domestic political timetables?
PM: President Obama's been very clear that transition needs to be conditions-based. President Obama's been very clear that transition will start in 2011 and this meeting has announced that transition will start in early 2011, but he's also been very clear that it will be a conditions-based process aiming to meet President Karzai's goal of security leadership transition by 2014, so the way forward, I think is clear, and leaders around the table constantly referred to the conditions-based transition and I was not the only leader to make the point that transition, when it occurs in an area, needs to be irreversible, that we should not transition out prematurely, only to have to transition back in.
JOURNALIST: But you don't think there's a risk that some countries will succumb to the temptation to pull their troops out in advance of an election to be able to seen to be taking a safer option?
PM: I think in countries around the world there are obviously varying domestic political pressures, but one of the reasons for having meetings like this one is so that countries can come together and agree the strategy, and that's what has occurred today, and the agreement is for a conditions-based transition process.
JOURNALIST: And you're confident that President Karzai is 100 per cent on board with a conditions-based withdrawal and what sounds like a flexible deadline, then?
PM: Look, President Karzai was at the table today. He had the opportunity to outline his aims and vision for Afghanistan to the leaders. He has made it very clear that his goal is to see transition to Afghan security leadership in 2014. If we look in the area where we work, Uruzgan province, that does accord with the best estimates of our Defence Force about the training time necessary, so I think President Karzai's goal fits in precisely with the agreed strategy at this meeting.
JOURNALIST: Given that the ultimate aim is to deny terrorists a base to operate from, Yemen is developing as exactly that. Would you rule out possible military intervention in Yemen, being involved in a similar sort of operation in Yemen if that situation isn't sorted?
PM: Well, I don't think we can go around speculating in that kind of fashion. These matters are too serious.
I have spoken to the parliament about our concerns about other parts of the world where terrorism and terrorists are allowed to gain safe haven. I particularly pointed to Yemen and Somalia.
Australia is engaged in Afghanistan, but our counter-terrorism work and focus extends beyond that, including to other areas where we see potential problems, so it would be not correct to assume that our counter-terrorism effort globally is confined to our work in Afghanistan.
JOURNALIST: Could that evolve into a military-
PM: -Well, you simply don't speculate about these things and I won't be drawn on it. That wouldn't be responsible.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, can I ask you if you have any update on the situation with the coal mine in New Zealand and any involvement Australia is having, and particularly on the Australian that's trapped there?
PM: Acting Prime Minister Wayne Swan has spoken to the New Zealand Prime Minister. As you would know, we've offered whatever assistance we can provide, and some assistance is being provided through emergency management personnel.
As I understand the situation, they are still working on obtaining samples of gas to see if it is possible for rescuers to go in, so in these very difficult circumstances as loved ones get more and more anxious, our thoughts and our hearts go out to them. It's a very, very difficult time.
JOURNALIST: Can I ask you one more thing relating to the meetings today? Did anyone raise with you the state of the European economies and talk to you about Australia's economic position, seek any advice or take any council on economic management?
PM: I had a number of bilateral discussions and whenever, well, almost whenever we have bilateral discussions the strength of the Australian economy does come up. We are in a very, very different position to many nations around the world with whom we meet, so Australia is seen to have come out of the global financial crisis very strong.
I don't, I wouldn't suggest I was asked for advice, but there's certainly a sense of admiration and perhaps envy at the Australian economic results. Many of the nations I've met with during the course of this summit and in other places are in very difficult economic situations with very, very high unemployment rates and quite savage budget cut backs at the same time.
JOURNALIST: Do you fear that those could have a flow-on effect, particularly the contagion effect in Europe? That could have a flow-on effect around the world, and of course inevitably affect Australia, too.
PM: Well, with the global financial crisis we obviously saw that events starting in some parts of the world can flow through our financial system. That's why, through the G20, we've worked long and hard to bring new financial stability rules, so, you know, the world continues to work together to deal with the aftermath of the global financial crisis. There are obviously some individual nations now under particular pressures, like Ireland, and so that's been the subject of discussion at some of the bilateral meetings today, but the world, I think, at the G20 and beyond, has worked well together on financial stability, on coordinating macro-economic policy, and I believe we will continue to do so.
JOURNALIST: You're not worried about the immediate problem of Ireland, Portugal, possibly Spain, that that could slow-
PM: -Look, we obviously monitor closely all of these international events to assess possible impacts, but I'm not going to stand here and make dramatic forecasts for you.
We continue to take the best advice from Treasury and the best advice from Treasury about our economy is the growth and other data that you saw in the Mid Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook, and I don't have any advice or any reason to believe we should vary from those growth estimates.
JOURNALIST: You've had a pretty hectic international travelling schedule these past six weeks. Will you be relieved when you get home with your last big international meeting out of the way for a little while?
PM: I'll be relieved to be flying to the final parliamentary week, so we'll be flying into question time and we'll be looking forward to it, won't we? Love question time.
MINISTER SMITH: Absolutely. Couldn't think of anything better to be doing.
PM: Thank you.