Queen was not warned of Australia PM's 1975 sacking, letters show

Yahoo – AFP, July 14, 2020

The British monarch's representative in Australia, governor-general John Kerr, sparked
a constitutional crisis when he fired Gough Whitlam (AFP Photo/Adrian DENNIS)

Sydney (AFP) - Queen Elizabeth II was not informed in advance about the 1975 dismissal of Australia's prime minister by her representative in country, letters kept secret for decades and released Tuesday revealed.

The British monarch's representative in Australia, governor-general John Kerr, sparked a constitutional crisis when he fired Gough Whitlam, the democratically elected leader of the centre-left Labor party.

In May the High Court ruled more than 200 letters between the queen's private secretary and Kerr -- including many addressing the controversial affair -- should be made public.

Although the correspondence shows the queen was not told immediately prior to Whitlam's sacking, it confirms Kerr had exchanged extensive letters with the palace for months about his powers to oust the prime minister.

The queen, who is Australia's head of state, is supposed to stay above politics and make no decisions about government appointments.

Suspicion the palace played a direct role in Whitlam's ouster has long been cited by Australian Republicans arguing the country should break with the monarchy.

Historians are now combing through 1,200 pages of the so-called Palace Letters to see if the UK government tried to influence events in its former colony and what role the queen, her son and heir Prince Charles, and top royal advisers may have played.

'Skill and wisdom'

One extract shows Kerr informed the queen he had fired Whitlam shortly after taking the action on November 11, 1975.

"I should say I decided to take the step I took without informing the Palace in advance because, under the Constitution, the responsibility is mine, and I was of the opinion it was better for Her Majesty not to know in advance, though it is of course my duty to tell her immediately," he wrote.

The decision capped a protracted political stalemate after the opposition-controlled Senate refused to pass the government's budget, severely weakening Whitlam's position.

The letters confirm the palace knew Kerr had been considering the options available to him under his constitutional "reserve powers", which included dismissing Australia's leader -- an action no other governor-general has taken before or since.

Gough Whitlam, pictured here in 2004, was fired in 1975 after leading
Australia for three years (AFP Photo/TORSTEN BLACKWOOD)

"I'm also keeping my mind open as to the constitutional issues," Kerr wrote to Martin Charteris, the queen's private secretary, on September 12, 1975.

"If the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition get into a battle in which the Senate has defeated the budget, the Prime Minister refuses to recommend a dissolution, my role will need some careful thought," he wrote.

Charteris later praised Kerr for his approach, writing a week before the dismissal he was "playing the vice-regal hand with skill and wisdom".

"The fact you have powers is recognised. But it's also clear you will only use them in the last resort, and then only for constitutional -- and not for political -- reasons," he said.

'Highly contested'

The palace said the release of the letters "confirms that neither Her Majesty nor the Royal Household had any part to play in Kerr’s decision to dismiss Whitlam".

"Throughout her reign, Her Majesty has consistently demonstrated... support for Australia, the primacy of the Australian constitution and the independence of the Australian people, which the release of these letters reflects."

But Professor Jenny Hocking, a biographer of Whitlam who took the case to court, said the political nature of the correspondence was "startling" given the requirement for the head of a constitutional monarchy to remain neutral.

Hocking said the discussion of reserve powers in particular was "scandalous" because its existence in Australia is "highly contested" by legal and political scholars.

After sacking Whitlam, Kerr appointed opposition Liberal leader Malcolm Fraser as interim prime minister, sparking chaos in Canberra and protests on the steps of parliament.

Fraser went on to win a landslide election victory later that year.

Australia became independent in 1901 but retained the British monarch as head of state.

A referendum on becoming a republic failed in 1999, but republicans hope recent royal scandals could help revive efforts to cut ties with the monarchy.

Yuriko Koike: savvy politician challenging Japan's glass ceiling

Thisismoney– AFP, 5 July 2020

Yuriko Koike has managed a successful career in Japan's male-dominated
political landscape

Tokyo governor Yuriko Koike is a conservative political veteran with a commanding media presence who has shown the toughness needed to climb the greasy pole of Japan's male-dominated politics.

The former television anchorwoman, long seen as potentially Japan's first female prime minister, has found herself in the national spotlight during the coronavirus pandemic, appearing daily on TV to brief the megacity's 14 million residents.

Her calm and measured speeches, peppered with catchy slogans, have presented a sharp contrast to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who has been viewed as too slow to act or too rigid and opaque in his addresses.

Koike swept easily to a second term but critics say the 67-year-old's first four years as governor were more about grabbing headlines than getting the job done.

Fluent in English, and with conversational Arabic, Koike is a rare internationalist in Japan's navel-gazing politics.

Born in 1952 in Ashiya city in western Japan, Koike attended the region's Kwansei Gakuin University before graduating from Cairo University in Egypt in 1976.

After a stint as a translator, she worked as a television broadcaster, interviewing Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi and Palestinian Liberation Organisation chair Yasser Arafat.

She first won an upper house seat in 1992 before switching to the more powerful lower house the following year.

She joined the ruling Liberal Democratic Party in 2002 and became environment minister in 2003.

During Abe's first stint as PM, Koike served as a special advisor before becoming Japan's first female defence minister.

While she rubbed shoulders with top political figures, she enjoyed only lukewarm support inside the LDP and failed in her bid to become party chief.

When she ran in the Tokyo gubernatorial race in 2016, the LDP supported a different, male candidate.

The people of Tokyo, however, embraced her reformist zeal and gave her a landslide victory, making her the first woman governor of the Japanese capital, home to more than a tenth of Japan's entire population.

'Party of Hope' 

The next year, she took a huge gamble in launching a new national "Party of Hope", but support fizzled after a promising start, where it looked like she could present a serious challenge to Abe.

Her decision to stay as governor left the public unsure about who would become PM if her party won the national election and she suffered a heavy defeat at the polls.

Allies turned rivals, Koike and Abe maintained cordial working relations as they jointly prepared for the Tokyo Olympics, which would have been a major political legacy for both of them.

But the coronavirus pandemic forced a one-year delay of the Games after costly preparations.

Koike quickly shifted her focus to the fight against the infection, giving daily media briefings and issuing warnings to Tokyoites that worse was to come.

She repeated catchy anti-virus slogans in her televised addresses to encourage the entire nation to stay home and avoid crowds.

In her re-election bid, Koike comfortably ran an independent, online-only campaign, with senior LDP members opening supporting her bid.

North Korea says no need for talks with US

Asiatimes – AFP, July 4, 2020

Dialogue nothing more than a tool for US grappling with political crisis, North's vice foreign minister says

North Korean Deputy Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui said 'the US is mistaken
if it thinks things like negotiations would still work on us'. Photo: AFP

North Korea does “not feel any need” to resume talks with Washington, a senior diplomat for the country said Saturday, days after Seoul called for a summit as it seeks improved ties with Pyongyang.

The statement by the North’s vice foreign minister Choe Son Hui came after former US national security advisor John Bolton on Thursday reportedly said President Donald Trump might pursue another meeting with leader Kim Jong Un in October.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in – who has long backed engagement with the North – on Tuesday also called for another meeting between Kim and Trump, saying the South would be making “utmost efforts” to make it happen.

But Pyongyang does “not feel any need to sit face to face with the US”, Choe said in a statement carried by the North’s official Korean Central News Agency.

“Dreamers” had been raising hopes of an “October surprise”, she added.

“The US is mistaken if it thinks things like negotiations would still work on us,” Choe said.

Washington “does not consider the DPRK-US dialogue as nothing more than a tool for grappling (with) its political crisis”, Choe added, using the North’s official name.

Bolton had reportedly said Trump would meet with Kim if it would help his re-election chances.

The North has “already worked out a detailed strategic timetable” to deal with the “long-term threat” from Washington, Choe said.

Talks over Pyongyang’s nuclear arsenal have been stalled since a Hanoi summit between Trump and Kim collapsed in early 2019 over what the North would be willing to give up in exchange for sanctions relief.

Recent reports have said US Deputy Secretary of State Stephen Biegun is due to visit Seoul next week to discuss talks with North Korea, although the South’s foreign ministry has not confirmed the trip.

Last month Pyongyang issued a series of vitriolic condemnations of the South over anti-North leaflets that defectors send back across the militarised border – usually attached to balloons or floated in bottles.

It also upped the pressure by blowing up an inter-Korean liaison office and threatening military measures against Seoul but last week said it had suspended those plans in an apparent sudden dialling down of tensions.

Choe’s statement comes a day after Seoul’s presidential Blue House appointed as its new spy chief a former lawmaker who played a crucial role in organising the first inter-Korean summit back in 2000.

The move is widely seen as a sign of Moon’s determination to maintain pro-engagement policies despite the North’s abandonment of its nuclear and missile test moratoriums.