What today's Australian newspapers say-Friday, August 27, 2004

AAP General News (Australia)
08-27-2004
What today's Australian newspapers say-Friday, August 27, 2004

SYDNEY, Aug 27 AAP - All fair-minded Australians will welcome the fact that, after
more than two years in detention at Guantanamo Bay, David Hicks has been brought to trial,
The Australian said today in an editorial.

Mr Hicks, who was captured in Afghanistan among Taliban forces in December 2001, has
been charged by a military tribunal with conspiracy to commit war crimes by training with
al-Qaeda, aiding the enemy during the war to remove the Taliban, and attempted murder
of coalition troops, including Australians.

It is true that, as an unlawful enemy combatant, Mr Hicks' civil rights have been curtailed
and he does not enjoy all the benefits of a trial in a civil court. However, he is receiving
an open trial with full legal counsel, the presumption of innocence and the right to remain
silent.

For him to be convicted, four of the five judges must find him guilty. And to demonstrate
he is not without rights and resources, Mr Hicks won the opening round yesterday, being
granted a trial date early next year, rather than the September date pressed by the prosecution.

Ample evidence for a travesty of justice can be found in the proceedings at Guantanamo
Bay, The Age said.

Mr Hicks faces grave charges based on alleged involvement with the Taliban and if found
guilty of such offences should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law, the newspaper
said.

But by holding the hearings on a military base at Guantanamo Bay, the Bush administration
has contended it is outside the jurisdiction of US or international law.

The editorial said it was misleading for the Howard Government to suggest the proceedings
accorded with Australia's criminal justice system.

In a shameful irony, Australia is the only western nation that agreed to submit its
citizens to the US military's kangaroo court.

This travesty of a judicial process is itself an attack on the freedoms that the coalition
of the willing has gone to war to defend, the newspaper concluded.

The Herald Sun newspaper devotes its entire editorial space today to hurdler Jana Pittman,
who it says is following in Cathy Freeman's footsteps.

The green and gold "Aussies always dare" message on her knee spelt out a philosophy
that saw Pittman run her heart out, the newspaper said.

The newspaper said it was incredible that a former gold medallist suggested on talkback
radio that Pittman was a drama queen who made it all seem worse than it was.

Jana Pittman is an emotional young woman. She cares and she dares, the paper said.

The words on her knee will wash away, but her self-belief will carry her through another
four years.

Sometimes, no matter how much we wish it, no matter how much it seems the fates should
intervene to ensure the right results, the longed-for happy ending doesn't happen, The
Daily Telegraph said.

Yesterday, we were supposed to celebrate the most remarkable victory of all time -
Jana Pittman in the 400m hurdles. The script had been written and until the last 10 seconds
everyone was following the prompts.

Exactly three weeks ago, Jana injured the cartilage in her right knee during a routine
warm-up race in Zurich, and the immediate assessment was that she could not possibly compete
in Athens, so the Olympic dream was over, it seemed.

But the sporting gods had no appetite for such a simple storyline, instead it was written
that Jana would undergo surgery and work for a miraculous recovery so she could keep her
date with Olympic Games destiny.

And so it was, but the conclusion was not the one we had longed to see.

The fury of Sally Robbins' eight team mates when she stopped rowing and slumped in
her seat in their Olympic final was an understandable reaction, the main editorial in
The Advertiser said.

The newspaper said the crew had devoted four years to winning a medal in Athens but
saw their chance evaporate with an unpredictable action by one member of the team.

It is not fair to blame Ms Robbins, to hang her out to dry, the editorial said. She
has her reasons and must live with her own demons.

But her team-mates have a right to do what they did, to express their disappointment
and annoyance. They would be less than human to react in any other way, the editorial
concluded.

Sydney Harbour is the playground for much of the city and in more ways than one, its
lifeblood, The Sydney Morning Herald said.

Now the government wants to establish a comprehensive set of ground rules to control
its foreshores. Getting it right cannot be left to happenstance, as the hodgepodge of
rules for development along differing parts of the harbour testifies.

Eyesores such as the Blues Point Tower, for example, have removed for generations the
chance to develop a natural partner to the Opera House on the western side of the Harbour
Bridge. And as we have seen increasingly over the past few years, tussling over plans
for sites up and down the harbour is now part and parcel of the city's commercial life
- all the more so as the value of what is at stake continues to escalate.

When the anti-heroes of Elmore Leonard's crime novels plea-bargain their way to some
easy state time, they're still at the sentencing judge's mercy, The Australian Financial
Review said.

The settlement of an action under the Trade Practices Act for a civil penalty is not
exactly a plea bargain, but it has parallels. Roger Gyles is the second federal court
judge in two years to take the Australian Competition and Consumer COmmission to task
for presenting a lenient settlement of a case against a company that has owned up to an
offence under the TPA to the court as a fair accompli. The judge said on Wednesday that
the $1.5 million civil penalty the ACCC sought from George Weston, which had admitted
- after four years of denials - to an unsuccessful attempt to fix the price of flour was
"very much at the low end of the range for "typical cartel behaviour". This was notoriously
difficult to detect and deterrence accordingly demanded a heavy penalty, he explained.

The Queensland government's official response to the deliberate rundown of the state's
electricity distribution network has moved from appalling to out-of-control, Brisbane's
Courier-Mail newspaper says.

Rather than concentrate on recruiting qualified staff, Energex has resorted to hiring
expensive spin doctors to brief Members of Parliament on improvements to the system.

Both the Government and the power authorities seem unable to grasp the fact that the
problems will not be overcome and the network will not reach optimum performance levels
by an ill-conceived propaganda exercise, the editorial says.

While the government blames everything from accounting issues, to a media beat-up for
the problems, consumers will continue to be victims of political priorities.

The Beattie Government has rapidly destroyed its credibility and goodwill with the
electorate in its handling of this issue, and in its refusal to acknowledge it played
a major role in creating the problems, it says.

"Mr Beattie and the power authorities will need more than a team of highly paid public
relations consultants to deflect the anger. Voters have memories."

AAP cmc

KEYWORD: EDITORIALS (REISSUING)

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