Mr McARTHUR (2:21 PM) —My question is addressed to the Minister for Foreign Affairs. Would the minister inform the House of the government's proposal to prepare a white paper on terrorism? How has this reinforced measures the government has taken to protect Australia against a terrorist threat?

Mr DOWNER (Minister for Foreign Affairs) —First, I thank the honourable member for Corangamite for his question and for the interest he shows. My department has been working for some weeks now on the preparation of a white paper on the broader issue of terrorism. This work was well under way, by the way, before the Madrid bombing, but the Madrid bombing has highlighted the need to make sure that we do everything we possibly can to communicate these issues not just to the Australian community but, if I may say so, importantly to the broader international community.

The fact of the white paper is an important development. Its purposes will be to present Australia's view—an authoritative view—of the modern terrorist threat and, obviously, to explore the issue of how the government is responding internationally to this terrorist threat. It will examine why the audacity and magnitude of the contemporary terrorist threat presents a fundamental threat to Australia's interests. This is not just something that affects one particular corner of the earth; this is something that affects the whole of the international community. It will explore the nature of the threat and the global dimensions and origins of it.

Importantly, it will explore the organisational proficiency, across national boundaries, of terrorist organisations and how and why these terrorist organisations deliberately target innocent people and have a quest for high human toll. It will outline how the threat is manifesting itself in our own region—the Asia-Pacific region—and what we are doing in our region to address that and how the region is working together to address it.

The war against terrorism, as the paper will make clear, is a global war and there has to be a global response. You cannot just shrink away into one corner of the earth and hope the problem will disappear. You have to be prepared to face this problem. You have to have the courage to address it and to deal with it and that has to be done on a global scale. We have to work together as an international community to do that and we have to work together as a regional community. The Asia-Pacific ministerial summit—cohosted by Hassan Wirajuda, the Indonesian foreign minister, and me in early February—is a very good illustration of what work is being done in the region to build cooperation on counter-terrorism. The white paper will address all of these issues and look for still further ways that we can enhance that international cooperation.

In conclusion to my answer to the honourable member's question, one of the important things about the white paper is that it will be as authoritative a document as you will find in describing what drives the terrorists: what their true motives and true objectives are. It is very important, in terms of public debate not just in this country but around the world, that we have a clear and comprehensive and sophisticated understanding of what the issues at stake really are.