Foreign Minister Penny Wong has swatted away questions about whether Australia will pressure India’s Hindu nationalist government to “take a stance” on press freedom after the government raided BBC offices and blocked a documentary critical of Prime Minister Narendra Modi earlier this year.
Speaking to reporters in New Delhi on Wednesday, Wong refused to address growing concerns among human rights organisations over reports of rising violence against minorities in India, and its move to ban a BBC documentary critical of Modi’s role in the 2002 Gujarat riots.
The two-part documentary, titled India: The Modi Question, covered a newly obtained report from the British Foreign Office that claimed Modi was “directly responsible” for the “climate of impunity” that enabled the violence. It was banned across India after it went to air in January.
Last month, the BBC said in a statement that India’s Income Tax Authorities raided their offices in New Delhi and Mumbai, just weeks after India’s foreign ministry spokesman Arindam Bagchi branded the documentary a “propaganda piece”. Modi rejects accusations that he had any responsibility for the violence.
“I understand why you’re asking me that, but you wouldn’t expect me to talk about what leaders might or might not talk about,” Wong said. “What I can say to you is we are friends, we are comprehensive strategic partners and we engage on human rights issues regularly.”
When pushed, Wong went on to insist Labor is engaging with the “Indian system”. Here’s an excerpt of the transcript:
JOURNALIST: But Minister, that documentary, the BBC documentary about this incident was banned in India. Does that concern you, considering you are such strong partners, you both support the free press, is that something you’ll be pressuring India to take a stance on?
FOREIGN MINISTER: Again, I’d say to you, I’d refer to my answer to your colleague. But obviously, we have engaged with the Indian system on those issues and on other issues.
JOURNALIST: What was Australia’s reaction to the raids on the BBC last month?
FOREIGN MINISTER: Well, as I’ve said to you, we have engaged with the Indian system on those issues.
JOURNALIST: What do you mean when you say —
FOREIGN MINISTER: That’s what I mean.
JOURNALIST: What does that mean?
FOREIGN MINISTER: That’s what I mean. It’s — those are the words I’m using and I’m not going to go into those matters any further.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was similarly vague when asked at a press conference on Tuesday whether the issues would be a topic of discussion when he meets with Modi during his visit to India next week.
Albanese said the Australian government has returned to “acting like a diplomatic government should”, and that he looks forward to welcoming Modi to Australia for the Quad Leaders’ meeting later this year.
Albanese’s reluctance to criticise the Modi government comes as Labor consults with media executives pushing for greater press freedoms at home.
Earlier this week, bosses at major news publishing divisions including News Corp, Nine, Guardian Australia, the ABC, and Private Media — owners of this masthead — gathered with Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus behind closed doors to make their case for stronger media protections.
At the top of the agenda was a push to prevent police from being able to raid the offices and homes of journalists homes for “doing their jobs”, along with efforts to broaden access to court documents, get stronger protections for whistleblowers, and deliver further defamation reform.
In prepared opening remarks, Dreyfus said: “Unlike the former government which ignored not one, but two separate bipartisan committee reports, the Albanese government intends to progress press freedom and protection of press freedom.”
You can always count on our government, and all the other much vaunted ‘liberal democracies’ to make much noise about how wonderful liberal democracy is, but almost never do or say anything of significance to defend or maintain it, and they often prefer to weaken it; there’s always some handy excuse to undermine it a bit more.
Wong is one of the better ministers of recent years but even so she puts making money with the help of Modi’s increasingly tyrannical India far ahead of any airy-fairy principles of liberal democracy. When capitalism collides with liberal democracy there can only be one winner.
So, let me get this clear. India banned the broadcast of a program from a British propaganda outfit. This was an offense against freedom of the press. Britain banned broadcasts from a propaganda outfit in a rather large country in the northern hemisphere. This prevented the spread of misinformation which might confuse public opinion.
Meanwhile there’s a bloke named Julian kept locked up in a British maximum-security prison from where he will presently be transferred to a US maximum-security prison for using press freedom to inform the public of things which they weren’t meant to know about. That is, for confusing public opinion.
Why would you expect Minister Wong, who frequently gives the impression of considerable intelligence, to tread in that puddle of excrement?
Because it’s her job. She should show leadership. This is a concerning development given our close ties with both countries. She’s doing it so as to not alienate the Indian vote in many suburban often marginal electorates in Sydney and Melbourne. That’s why. Electoral politics and ethnic politics referenced domestically are polluting our body politic and our society. Truth is taking a second place to politics. Utterly shameful and it was never this bad. Not even during the Vietnam War in the 1960s and 70s. We are afraid of offending Chinese when we tell the truth. We are afraid of offending Indians when we tell the truth. Yet all the time we are expected to hand our heads in perpetual shame over the Aboriginal Question or First Nations issues. Do you think either China or India care about our First Nations peoples given their human right records. Our multicultural society means we can never tell the truth!
It must be frightfully frustrating to know so much truth and then find the Untermensch just won’t believe you…
Do you know that the Indian Supreme Court has found him innocent after a very lengthy prosecution? They also found that the journalist, Rana Ayubs book was factually incorrect and “based upon surmises, conjectures, and suppositions and has no evidentiary value.” It’s not her job to question the Supreme Court of India. That too on questionable evidence driven by ulterior motives.
Transcript appears to reflect an attempt at live ‘gotcha reporting’ not only without any context, but disregards the need to maintain diplomacy, Australia’s well earned reputation for neo colonial dog whistling and in Asia, telling others how to behave…..
Locally, not sure how much media is covering India, Modi and banning of a critical BBC doco, apart from cricket, versus the opportunity to try show Labor government and Ministers as weak?
I, for one, would like to see this documentary, and make up my own mind. When’s it coming out, or are we going to engage in more circle jerks and ban it from being broadcast in Australia?
India: The Modi Question is available to stream on the BBC iPlayer site any time you like, if you are signed up and have the means to deal with the BBC’s geo-blocking.
It’s also easy to find other web sites hosting it, presumably without permission. Of course it would be wrong to endorse that sort of thing and I never would.
I’ve seen it. It didn’t contain anything, as far as I could see, that someone who follows Indian affairs didn’t already know. Worth watching though
This highly consistent by Wong as she refused to criticise the US & Sweden and the UK on their attack on Assange.
Well of course Penny Wong would refuse to condemn India’s raid on BBC offices. She, as a gay person, refused to support the movement for marriage equality in its initial stage and voted against it when it was put before Parliament by the Greens. She has form in double speak and hypocrisy our disappointing Foreign Minister.
Yep, she can risibly stonewall up there with the best traducers of democracy the LNP has to offer.