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Editorial: On sunburn, crocs and democracy

Subscribers to the Australian government's traveler alert service, issued by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT), occasionally receive an update on hazards associated with being in Taiwan. The most recent of these was issued on Friday last week, and is largely concerned with the avian flu threat.

But after a token reference to global terrorism, the advice begins with something else.

"There have been incidents of assault by taxi drivers on female passengers travelling alone at night. Purse snatching by thieves on motorcycles has been reported," it warns, without any details or figures.

The DFAT advice is based on a number of reports of wholly unrepresentative criminal activity. But it is the lack of balance that is objectionable, even more so in the context of a government that has entered a new era of "intelligence"-driven security measures in the face of the threat posed by Islamic terrorists at home.

The Australian parliament on Thursday rushed through legislation to head off what the government claims was an impending terrorist event, though it provided no details, and earned the wrath of some state police, who complained that the process may have compromised investigations into the very suspects thought to be planning attacks.

The paradox here is that Australia in the past showed far more maturity in its approach toward formidable enemies -- communism and the Soviet Union, above all else -- than the Australia of the present, which is assertive, literate, rich and well-connected. Yet, seemingly overwhelmed by the threat of a handful of Islamic fundamentalists, hardliners attempted to remove a number of fundamental democratic liberties -- such as the freedom to advocate the removal of Queen Elizabeth as head of state -- that would have corroded its own reputation as a country from which the region's democracy activists can draw inspiration.

Australian Prime Minister John Howard and Attorney General Philip Ruddock, whose handling of the Tampa refugee scandal in 2001 showed just how willing they were to manipulate an electorate with false information and fearmongering, are at the head of this new security regime. Australia can only be thankful for the intervention of moderate Liberal Party parliamentarians and Labor Party state premiers, who prevented the passage of some incredible restrictions to free speech manifestly unrelated to terrorism, as well as the possibility that, for example, the parent of a terrorist suspect could be jailed for years for telling the other parent about the child's detention.

Despite this depressing mixture of politicization of security procedures and incompetence, less reputable Australian commentators continue to react to critics' dismay over the original proposed changes with the puerile argument that critics are more concerned with protecting the civil liberties of terror suspects than the lives of ordinary Australians. Such commentary encapsulates the -- oddly familiar -- polemical jungle of media debate in that country, in which one is increasingly either friend or foe.

Taiwan, of course, has its own security crisis, though the threat is not suicide bombers; rather, it is from China, one of Australia's most treasured allies.

And astonishing as it may seem, Taiwan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs came very close to a situation where it might have had to consider issuing the following travel advice for Australia: Beware sunburn, crocodiles and pretensions to a police state.
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