India 'n' ya homes in readers of the lost (View from the) Arch

Eyes turned to the Subcontinent with uranium export plans India as citizen Mohamed Haneef was released from prison. Meanwhile Mr Howard visited WA and Dili, Mr Rudd dropped forests for houses and Mr Carpenter initiated Drug Summit action.

Mohamed Haneef

As a review by Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions Damian Bugg into the terror charge against Indian doctor Mohamed Haneef led to the conclusion that there would be no reasonable prospect of a conviction, Immigration Minister Kevin Andrews was put under pressure to justify his decision to revoke the man's visa.

Dr Haneef was alleged to have provided support to a terrorist organisation plotting attacks in Britain by giving his mobile phone SIM card to a relative later linked to the failed plan to bomb central London and Glasgow airport.

But the DPP found errors relating to the SIM card's location - in Liverpool, rather than Glasgow, and a previous allegation that Dr Haneef had lived with his cousins Sabeel and Kafeel Ahmed in the UK before arriving in Australia.

Kafeel Ahmed was allegedly driving the jeep in the Glasgow terror attack while Sabeel Ahmed has been charged with withholding information relating to a terrorist act.

"While there are inferences that are available from the material I have, I am of the view that they are not sufficiently strong to exclude reasonable hypotheses consistent with innocence," Mr Bugg said.

"In the circumstances of this case I do not believe that evidence to prove the case to the requisite standard will be obtained.

"On my view of the matter a mistake has been made," he said.

Mr Bugg said proceedings would be discontinued on his motion to tender no evidence in the case.

For his part, Mr Andrews told reporters in Canberra that he would seek further advice from the commonwealth Solicitor-General about whether he would need to reverse his decision to cancel the visa.

According to The Australian, Dr Haneef will remain in 'residential detention' at his Gold Coast home for the time being.

"That means that rather than being detained in immigration custody, namely in Villawood or some facility such as that, he will be released into residential detention which means that he can reside at his unit on the Gold Coast,'' Mr Andrews told reporters.

"Or if he wishes to reside somewhere other than that unit on the Gold Coast, then any reasonable request in that regard will be taken into account and met.''

Uranium to India, not Pakistan: Downer

While today the Indian government asked Australia to re-issue a visa Dr Haneef to facilitate his return to his home country, Foreign Minister Alexander Downer was flagging plans to sell uranium to the nation.

Australia currently sells uranium to China, but not India, which is the world's second most populous country.

Mr Downer told reporters yesterday that the sale would help to curb greenhouse emissions, with uranium to be sold for electricity generation purposes only.

India is one of only four countries not to have signed the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, which limits the spread of nuclear weapons.

But Mr Downer said exports could go ahead if India agreed to inspections by the International Atomic Energy Agency, similar to a deal being negotiated between India and the United States.

"In these circumstances it is a possibility that we would begin negotiations with India over supplying uranium to power stations which were subject to United Nations inspections and to the regime of the international atomic agency," he told reporters in Adelaide.

"But we haven't made any final decision about this.

"It is still something that we are considering and we certainly will have to wait and see what the conclusion is of negotiations between India and America."

Mr Downer said India had no record of exporting nuclear weapons technology to other countries and the export of uranium could help the country's burgeoning economy grow.

Labor's foreign affairs spokesman Robert McClelland said Mr Downer should be looking for ways to encourage India to sign up to the NPT, not to get around the treaty.

"Instead of writing cabinet submissions seeking approval for the export of Australian uranium to India, the foreign minister should be urging and leading greater global nuclear safeguards cooperation, and join Labor in campaigning for wide-ranging reform of the NPT to encourage India to join," Mr McClelland said in a statement.

"Mr Downer's exuberant promotion of nuclear power is cause for concern - particularly given his weakness on the issue of nuclear non-proliferation."

But Mr Downer said the Hawke Labor government sold uranium to France before the Frnch signed up to the NPT in 1992.

That said, he was not willing to extend the offer to Pakistan, telling reporters in Perth today the nation had shown no interest in negotiating with the International Atomic Energy Agency for a system of safeguards and inspections for its two non-military nuclear power stations.

"I don't think that bears any prospect in the foreseeable future of exporting to Pakistan unless Pakistan gets into some sort of a system of UN inspections and controls over its two nuclear facilities and it comes to Australia and signs a nuclear safeguards agreement," Mr Downer told reporters in Perth.

"It doesn't seem likely that's about to happen."

That came after calls yesterday from Pakistan's Minister for Religious Affairs Ejaz ul-Haq, for Australia to consider selling uranium to Pakistan as well.

He rejected concerns Islamabad would use the uranium in nuclear weapons.

"Pakistan's nuclear program is totally peaceful," he said.

"If we are going to go further into nuclear it is going to be for energy, because we are suffering from power shortages."

Forestry

The federal branch of the Australian Labor Party could well sympathise with that statement, having been short of power since 1996. Nonetheless, it was the party's electorally disastrous forestry policy that Opposition Leader Kevin Rudd dealt with this week.

In a visit to Tasmania this week, Mr Rudd announced a $20 million package to support Tasmanian forestry, committing a Labor government to the existing Tasmanian Community Forest Agreement that protects an additional 170,000 hectares of forest.

The announcement rids the federal party of former opposition leader Mark Latham's forestry policy for the state, a plan which was blamed for the loss of two Labor seats in the 2004 federal election.

Mr Latham's plan called for saving up to 240,000 hectares of old-growth forests and the creation of an $800 million fund to protect forest jobs and retrain those moving out of them.

Tasmanian Premier Paul Lennon welcomed Mr Rudd's pledge not to protect any more of the state's forests from logging.

He said Mr Rudd's policy "finally ends the tired and unnecessary practice of the state being used as election bait".

"We can move forward with unity and confidence under this policy," Mr Lennon said.

But Tasmanian Greens Senator Christine Milne said Mr Rudd was banking on the desperation of anti-Howard voters, and was failing to deliver policy outcomes

"He is no longer a symbol of hope, just a younger version of the Howard dries," she wrote in a piece published on website Crikey.

"Rudd's assurances -- that he's the same social and economic conservative, the same on Haneef, the same on Indigenous communities, the same on coal and uranium -- are increasing anxiety levels in those who want a change of policy as well as a change of government," she wrote.

But Mr Rudd said he was not worried if the Greens, whose vote is strong in Tasmania, portrayed his policy as a betrayal.

"They can say what they like," he said. "My job is not to appease or to please them.

"My job as the alternative prime minister is to seek to govern in the national interest."

Housing

While the actual Prime Minister was in East Timor on Thursday, Community Services Minister Mal Brough announced a federal government plan to force State governments to bid against private developers for funding to build public housing.

Mr Brough said he was forced to make the changes to the Commonwealth State Housing Agreement due to continued communication breakdowns between the states, territories and commonwealth government.

The announcement overshadowed Mr Rudd's housing affordability summit in Canberra, where he pledged to set up a national council to monitor housing affordability and supply.

He was applauded by the audience when he confirmed that Labor would establish a new federal cabinet minister for housing if elected.

Drug Summit

Meanwhile the State Government acted on a summit held earlier in the month, with Premier Alan Carpenter announcing he would allocate an extra $808,000 over the next four years to help rehabilitate mothers addicted to amphetamines.

Speaking to reporters at the opening of extensions to Perth drug rehabilitation facility Cyrenian House, Mr Carpenter said the money would be used to employ three additional counselling and welfare workers for the facility's Saranna program.

"The staff will provide individual counselling, group support and assistance in addressing general welfare and other issues facing these women and their children," he told AAP.

"This initiative is the first arising from the recent Ice Summit and more measures will be unveiled in the coming months."

Saranna has eight family cottages but six new family accommodation units are planned for completion in November 2007.

Swan Valley Noongar camp

The Carpenter government had a win earlier this week, after Prime Minister John Howard said he will stop any Commonwealth funding for an appeal of the state's decision to close the Swan Valley Noongar Camp, which was shut down after revelations of child abuse at the site.

The case claimed the State's decision was contrary to the Racial Discrimination Act, and was funded by the Commonwealth Attorney General's Department under the Public Interest and Test Case Scheme, according to WA Attorney-General Jim McGinty.

But a subsequent announcement from Mr Howard's office denied the government had funded any case, but rather an initial challenge of the decision to close the camp, set up before the Premier wrote to the Prime Minister with concerns over case funding.

"On 9 July, the Australian Government received an application from solicitors representing a female relative of Robert Bropho seeking funding to support an appeal against the Federal Court's decision," the announcement said.

"That application was considered on its merits, and in accordance with relevant guidelines, and refused."

"The Australian Government abhors sexual abuse of children and supports strongly the decision taken by the Western Australian government to close the Swan Valley camp," it said.

The final word

In a week when the Prime Minister grabbed more headlines for slipping on the ground outside of 6PR than he did for the interview that went on inside, the final word goes to people involved in a WA taxpayer-funded survey on road safety.

The Oppostion claimed the 35-question online survey was a backdoor polling exercise, asking respondents to gauge their level of concern on campaign platforms including housing affordability, climate change, the Iraq war, Aboriginal issues and daylight saving.

"Combined with information on the person's postcode and age group gathered as part of the survey, the information may be used to target election material for Kevin Rudd during the federal election campaign," an announcement from Deputy Opposition Leader Troy Buswell and Shadow Road Safety Minister John McGrath said.

But Police Minister John Kobelke denied it was a political move, claiming the Opposition was jumping at shadows and the question was included purely to find out how people placed the importance of road safety against other important issues.

"There is nothing secretive about it and it will only be used to make sure we bring forward our new road safety strategy," he told a WA newspaper.

Arch isn't sure about either argument, but reckons it's enough to drive someone off the rails.