http://blakandblack.com/2012/
On 2nd
May, 2012 the Vanuatu Daily Post reported that Private Secretary in the Prime Minister’s Office Clarence Marae had been arrested at Sydney International Airport by the Australian Federal Police (“AFP”) whilst accompanying Vanuatu’s Prime Minister Meltek Sato Kilman Livtunvanu to Israel on a diplomatic mission.
Posted on May 10, 2012 by Bakchos
Following his arrest, Mr Marae was
charged with conspiring to defraud the Commonwealth, contrary to section
86 (1) and 29D of the Crimes Act 1914. The allegations underpinning the
charges relate to an incident or a series of incidents which occurred
more than ten years before.
What should be of paramount concern to all of the Pacific’s Indigenous people and what has clear echoes in the AFP’s now discredited treatment of Mr Julian Moti QC, the former Attorney-General of the Solomon Islands, is the high-handed manner in which the Australian Government and the AFP treat the Indigenous people of the Pacific, including their political and beaurocratic leaders.
In a statement issued from the office of Vanuatu’s Prime Minister on 1st May, 2012, the Prime Minister stated that:
What should be of paramount concern to all of the Pacific’s Indigenous people and what has clear echoes in the AFP’s now discredited treatment of Mr Julian Moti QC, the former Attorney-General of the Solomon Islands, is the high-handed manner in which the Australian Government and the AFP treat the Indigenous people of the Pacific, including their political and beaurocratic leaders.
In a statement issued from the office of Vanuatu’s Prime Minister on 1st May, 2012, the Prime Minister stated that:
…the Prime Minister’s Office was totally unaware that Marae still had an outstanding issue with the Australian Federal authorities.The statement also stressed that this was a public embarrassment to the Prime Minister of Vanuatu and stressed that the Vanuatu Government is reviewing its options and has sought legal advice on the manner in which Marae’s arrest was orchestrated by the Australian Federal authorities at the Sydney International Airport, as it is suspected that in disallowing the delegation to go directly to the international transit lounge the actions may have infringed on international diplomatic protocols set out in international conventions ratified by both Australia and Vanuatu.
[…]
Prime Minister’s Office would however like to echo the sentiments forwarded to the Australian Government via a diplomatic note protesting the manner in which the Prime Minister and his delegation were forcibly diverted from the international transit area of Sydney Airport to the Customs area under Australian Government jurisdiction so that the warrant could be served on Mr Marae.
In fact, and typical of AFP arrogance when dealing with Indigenous people, the AFP have refused to enter into dialogue with Vanuatu over the issue, resulting in the Vanuatu Government issuing a statement on 9th May, 2012 giving the AFP 24 hours to close its liaison office, otherwise officers would face arrest for failing to ”take into account the decision of the Vanuatu government’‘.
Again, with strong resonances with the Moti affair, in 2004, Vanuatu’s then Foreign Minister, Barak Sope, wanted to throw the AFP out over allegations of spying and meddling with domestic politics. In May 2011, Australian lawyer and senior Australian Litigation Advisor to the Attorney-General of Vanuatu Ari Jenshel was expelled from Vanuatu by its government after it accused him of espionage.
Mr.
Jenshel was made to leave after the Australian government was warned he
faced imminent arrest over his activities as senior adviser in the
office of the Attorney-General in Port Vila. Among claims being
investigated by the police in Vanuatu are that sensitive government
documents have been copied and sent to the Australian Government in
Canberra. Mr. Jenshel, who is a former Australian Defence Force
lawyer seconded to Vanuatu five years ago as part of an AusAID program,
says any adverse findings against him by the Vanuatu police will be
based on fabrications.
Some of the documents allegedly copied relate to talks between leaders of Pacific countries including Vanuatu, aimed at developing a closer working relationship with Fiji’s interim Prime Minister, Commodore Frank Bainimarama.
Some of the documents allegedly copied relate to talks between leaders of Pacific countries including Vanuatu, aimed at developing a closer working relationship with Fiji’s interim Prime Minister, Commodore Frank Bainimarama.
The other documents Mr Jenshel is suspected of accessing, copying and sending to Canberra are confidential Vanuatu Government business and legal affairs, relating to taxation policy. Could these documents relate to Project Wickenby? Project Wickenby is a cooperative partnership between the ATO, Australian Federal Police, Australian Crime Commission, Australian Securities and Investments Commission, and the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions, with support from the Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre, the Australian Government Solicitor and the Attorney-General’s Department.
Specifically to Project Wickenby, Mr Marae is an alleged associate of Victorian accountant Ian Henke, who was jailed in March 2011 for a multimillion-dollar tax avoidance scheme working through Vanuatu. Is this why Mr Jenshel was expelled and Mr Marae arrested?
Moti and Marae acts of neo-colonial racism?
The question goes begging – if Mr Marae were accompanying say, the Prime Minister of Britain or the President of the United States or indeed the President of Indonesia on a diplomatic mission rather than the Prime Minister of Vanuatu, would the AFP have acted in such a high-handed manner? The answer, is probably not. Similarly, if Mr Moti were the Attorney-General of one of the aforementioned countries, would he have been treated in the way he was by the AFP? Again, the answer is probably not.
The difference is that Australia sees the Pacific as being nothing more than its colonial domain, a domain which Australia governs through direct police/military intervention (known in the 19th Century as Gun Boat Diplomacy) and/or a few shekels of silver pressed into the hands of those Pacific ‘leaders’ prepared to sell out their own people to a racist and corrupt Australia in return for the crumbs from Australia’s table.
Australia has tried to justify its neo-colonial interventions in the Pacific by arguing that it was bringing stability to the so-called ‘arc of instability.’
…The so-called ‘arc of instability’, which basically goes from East Timor through to the south-west Pacific states, means that not only does Australia have a responsibility in preventing and indeed assisting with humanitarian and disaster relief, but also that we cannot allow any of these countries to become havens for transnational crime, nor indeed havens for terrorism…There is no official list of member states in the Arc, however it has traditionally been accepted to include South-East Asian and Oceanic nations such as Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, East Timor, Indonesia and Fiji.
What Australia is really doing in the Pacific is using the tragic events which unfolded in New York on 11 September, 2001 as a pretext to economically colonize the Pacific for its own commercial ends.
In the words of former United States President Woodrow Wilson:
Since trade ignores national boundaries and the manufacturer insists on having the world as a market, the flag of his nation must follow him, and the doors of the nations which are closed against him must be battered down. Concessions obtained by financiers must be safeguarded by ministers of state, even if the sovereignty of unwilling nations be outraged in the process. Colonies must be obtained or planted, in order that no useful corner of the world may be overlooked or left unused[1].Actions speak louder than words. The actions of the AFP in both the Marae and Moti affairs speak volumes about the attitude of white Australia to the Indigenous peoples of the Pacific.
Post script News:
http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/international/radio/program/pacific-beat/support-in-pacific-for-expulsion-of-afp-from-vanuatu/941682
AFP’s long memory of alleged associations from the past
Of the many articles published this week concerning the recent arrest of Clarence Marae, private secretary to Vanuatu’s Prime Minister at Sydney International Airport, only one goes any way to explain why the Australian Federal Police may have taken the action they did.bjskane@vanuatu.com.vu
Ilya Gridneff, writing on May 2 says: “The Herald understands that the arrest is connected to the joint operation Project Wickenby, run predominantly by the Australian Taxation Office. Mr Marae is an alleged associate of the Victorian accountant Ian Henke, who in March last year was jailed, along with two Queensland accountants, for their roles in a multimillion-dollar tax avoidance scheme”
If this is indeed the basis for Marae’s arrest it not only shows that the AFP have very long memories, but also that one can never really escape one’s past – whatever that past may be.
In May 2008, the Australian Financial Review’s Matthew Drummond and Colleen Ryan reported under the headline: “Vanuatu dragnet opens up new front”.
“Ian Henke, who once tried to put former tax commissioner Michael Carmody on trial for war crimes and claimed the Australian Taxation Office was a legal fiction, has been charged over what the Australian Federal Police has (sic) alleged to be a $10 million asset-stripping scheme involving Vanuatu. “Mr Henke, 72, of Victoria, and Robin Huston, 62, of Queensland were summonsed to appear before Brisbane Magistrates Court.
“The AFP alleges the pair promoted a scheme that resulted in the assets of 69 companies being stripped and transferred through an “intricate network” of firms in Australia and Vanuatu.
“The companies, spread across five states, then told the ATO they could not meet their liabilities.
“The alleged asset-stripping scheme is understood to resemble the famous “bottom of the harbour” tax scheme of the 1980s.
“The summons issued to Mr Henke, who has previously described himself a “former senior ministerial policy adviser” and “businessman”, alleges that between July 1999 and May 2001 he conspired with five others to defraud the commonwealth. The alleged associates include Clarence Marae, a former deputy secretary of foreign affairs in Vanuatu, and Philip Northam, whose Vanuatu investment club was closed down by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission in 2004. Also named was Lance Miller, a former director of the Institute of Taxation Research.”
In August 2008 accountant Brian Francis Fox was arrested at Brisbane airport in connection with the same alleged asset-stripping scheme that occurred prior to his employment with Hawkes Law (previously KPMG) in Port Vila.
Brisbane Times reported in December 2011 that at the conclusion of a Supreme Court trial in March that year Henke, Huston and Fox were found guilty of conspiring to defraud the Commonwealth of more than $4.59 million. The trio devised, promoted and implemented the scheme between July 1, 1999 and May 23, 2001. [The scheme] involved setting up offshore bank accounts and companies. Through a series of elaborate and fraudulent transactions the men shifted the assets of various companies into the names of their former directors, before closing the businesses without paying off their tax debt.
Henke was initially sentenced to four and a half years in prison to be released on parole after 12 months; Fox to three years and nine months to be released on parole after nine months and Huston to four years jail to be released on parole after 10 months. However, the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions appealed their sentences on the grounds they were “manifestly inadequate”. The appeal was upheld. Henke’s sentence was increased from four and half years to six years imprisonment. He will now spend at least three years behind bars before he is eligible for parole.
Fox will spend the next two years and six months in prison, after his sentence was increased to five years and Huston will be imprisoned for three years, as his head sentence was increased from four to six years. “The offending here was serious, protracted and grossly dishonest,” Justice Muir said in his written judgment.
“It was embarked upon by Henke and Huston for personal gain. “Henke pocketed about $145,000 for his part in the scheme, while Huston received $40,000 and Fox gained professional fees through promoting the schemes with his clients. “It put at risk about $4.5 million of Commonwealth revenue,” Justice Muir said.
“The effect of evading tax liability is to deprive the community of revenue needed to provide government services and to impose an unfair burden on those who act honestly.”
The amounts gained by the trio hardly seem worth the risk but maybe risk, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.
In 1998, among other things “anti” – anti-tax, anti-Constitution, anti-Commonwealth – Henke’s Institute of Taxation Research (ITR) published a booklet entitled “30 Key Questions About the Australian Taxation System”. A friend in Fiji gave the writer a copy of it the same year. It is a flawed logic, but obviously Henke and his co-convicted didn’t see it that way.
Question 21 asks: “But don’t the ATO have incredible power to investigate and punish?
Henke’s answer: “In a nutshell, no! And what’s more they never have really had these powers. It didn’t matter so much when the old Taxation Department was simply an arm of the government, strict but operating very carefully and correctly. However the transition from Taxation Department to Australian Taxation Office introduced a new culture where bonuses are paid on the basis of the amount of tax collected. Not all ATO offices are on a bonus but enough are to make putting a return in no better than a lottery – but a lottery where you can’t win, you can only lose AND THEY PUT PART OF YOUR LOSS IN THEIR OWN POCKET. The problem is that letters from the ATO still bristle with threats to increase taxes, impose arbitrary penalties and quote various sections of the Income Tax (or other) Act in a way calculated to intimidate including threats to place honest citizens before the courts, a prospect most dread”.
Question 22 follows that line: “But don’t they always win in the courts?”
Henke: “Not any more. The court system may not be about truth - that disappeared long ago from the British/Australian legal system. It is about procedure and precedent and the rules of court and these can be turned against the ATO. It is a question of saying to the ATO ‘forget your rules and play according to ours where the dice aren’t loaded your way.’
“There is a simple question for the ATO. When did they win in a court against our arguments?”
Answer: March and December 2011.
Henke and his co-convicted have around 1000 long nights in jail to ponder it and the booklet’s concluding words: “The truth eventually exposes itself. Fact can’t be kept secret forever”.
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/breaking-news/carr-asks-vanuatu-to-reconsider-afp-move/story-e6freuyi-1226352315578
Kidnap and breach of diplomatic protocol: Kilman
Prime Minister Kilman
Prime Minister Sato kilman described the arrest of Clarence Marae by the Australian Federal Police at Sydney International Airport as “kidnap and breach of diplomatic protocol”.
PM Kilman made the remarks immediately upon his arrival in Port Vila yesterday afternoon from the visit to Israel.
“In my humble view, it was kidnap and a breach of diplomatic protocol,” Prime Minister Kilman remarked after being welcomed by the Deputy and Acting Prime Minister Ham Lini Vanuroroa, government ministers and officials and members of the diplomatic corps at Port Vila International Airport yesterday afternoon.
“It is my hope and prayers that Australia can shoulder any representation that will be made in a true spirit,” PM Kilman remarked.
“I am disappointed because Vanuatu and Australia have an agreement in place for exchange of information.
“But there was no information access to a person who should have been refused a visa to enter Australia in the first place.“They were aware, yet granted the visa which led to the arrest,” PM Kilman told government officials and reporters on his arrival yesterday afternoon.
“There is a very strong cooperation between Australia and Vanuatu but unfortunately what happened at Sydney airport is not a sign of the existing cooperation between Australia and Vanuatu. “And if Australia says she is one of the countries in the Pacific but does this to smaller nations in the Pacific then it infringed on the sovereignty of the country.
“We must realize that we are an independent country and must be prepared to accept the consequences of the decisions taken. “We are in the 21st century and must not create instability in the region which would in turn affect world peace,” a concerned Vanuatu Prime Minister remarked in relation to the AFP arrest of Mr Clarence Marae at Sydney International airport.
“Is Pacific important to Australia or not?” Prime Minister Kilman questioned. “If yes, then Australia must make her stand clear on the Pacific,” PM Kilman reiterated.
The Vanuatu Prime Minister thanked the Minister of Foreign Affairs and the senior officials of the Prime Minister’s Office for the Note of concern already communicated to the Australian Government on the issues. He said further considerations will be given on the issue.
Prime Minister Kilman told government officials and reporters that upon their arrival at Sydney International airport, they were taken to the Immigration and Customs and made to fill out forms and had to wait at one of the lounge. He said it was then that they realized that Mr Marae was not amongst them.
When questioning his whereabouts, they were told that he has been arrested by the Australian Federal Authorities.“I am disappointed in the way this was done and in my humble view, it was kidnap and breach of diplomatic protocol,” concerned Prime Minister Kilman said on his arrival in Port Vila yesterday.
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