Australia says it is not the sheriff of the South Pacific, but complaints over a rebel jailbreak in East Timor and riots in the Solomon Islands are putting its new activist foreign policy to the test.
In both countries Australia has troops or police on the ground in a peacekeeping role and in both cases it has been blamed for failures that plunged them deeper into crisis.
Australian Prime Minister John Howard has reacted angrily to the charges, but analysts said Wednesday he should expect increasing criticism as he follows through with the "Howard doctrine" of greater intervention in the region.
"This is part of growing up in foreign policy terms and you've got to cop the flak sometimes, that's just one of the costs," said Alan Dupont, a security analyst at the University of Sydney.
"One of the problems in taking a more active approach under the so-called Howard doctrine is we are going to suffer the consequences every time something goes wrong in one of these states and it's difficult to get any kudos," he said.
Howard has made it clear that he believes Australia, as the most powerful country in a region of tiny and impoverished island nations, has a responsibility to help them maintain stability.
He announced last month that the army would be boosted by 2,600 troops and the federal police force by 400 to cope with increasing international deployments.
But he rejected suggestions that he aspired to be the region's sheriff.
"Can I just place on the record my rejection of the proposition that Australia has become the sheriff of the Pacific," he told reporters.
On Wednesday, however, a clearly annoyed Howard said he would not accept Solomons Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare's expulsion of Canberra's high commissioner over an inquiry into rioting and for meddling in internal politics.
"We don't accept for a moment the expulsion of our high commissioner Patrick Cole," Howard told national radio, setting the stage for a diplomatic showdown.
"He was doing the right thing, he was representing the interests of Australia, he was concerned about corruption in the Solomon Islands," he said.
Howard's government has indicated it is concerned that the Solomons-appointed inquiry into the April riots would be used to put the blame on Australian police and exonerate two of Sogavare's political colleagues.
The Solomons government has suggested that the firing of tear gas at a political protest sparked the riots which led to the capital Honiara being trashed by rampaging mobs.
"There's a long-standing history of corruption and incompetence on the part of the government there and there has been a tendency to blame everybody but themselves for their problems," said Deakin University analyst Damien Kingsbury. "The reality is if Australia does not assist, many of these places would be in dire straits."
Australia was also blamed by the East Timorese Prime Minister Ramos Horta for a jailbreak last month that saw rebel military officer Alfredo Reinado walk out of prison with 56 others.
Howard and Foreign Minister Alexander Downer strenuously denied the charge, saying responsibility for prison security was in the hands of the East Timorese.
But Dupont said there was an element of joint responsibility for what he called "the great escape."
"I think that the security provided by the East Timorese was lax and the New Zealand and Australian security forces should have been a bit more alert to what might happen," he said.
Dupont said, however, that Australia was trying to be an honest broker in implementing the policy outlined by Howard three years ago to help stabilize some of the weak states in the region.
He said Australia's more active approach was driven by the need to prevent states failing, which could then create security problems, as well as a humanitarian obligation.
He dismissed as "a nonsense" the favorite taunt of former Malaysian prime minister Mahathir Mohamad that Australia was simply US President George W. Bush's "deputy sheriff" in the region.
"This is our backyard. If we had no relation with the US, we would be doing the same. We believe as the major power in the region that we have an obligation," Dupont said.
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