Key Points
- Indian police reportedly seized journalists’ phones and documents in January as part of what they insisted was a tax investigation.
- The raid followed the BBC airing a documentary, India: The Modi Question.
- Senator Wong had been reticent to publicly comment on the matter despite days of questions from Australian journalists.
Foreign Minister Penny Wong says she has spoken about attacks on the free press with her Indian counterpart, after the country’s authorities’ controversial raid on BBC offices in Mumbai and New Delhi.
Indian police reportedly seized journalists’ phones and documents in January as part of what they insisted was a tax investigation.
The raid followed the BBC airing a documentary — India: The Modi Question — which explores , which killed at least 800 people, mostly Muslims.
Senator Wong had been reticent to publicly comment on the matter despite days of questions from Australian journalists, on Thursday claiming to have “engaged” with India before saying: “Those are the words I’m using, and I’m not going to go into those matters any further”.
But she was more detailed after emerging from her meeting on Friday with Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar.
“As a matter of principle, we also support freedom of press, as I said to you yesterday, that is an Australian view,” she told reporters in New Delhi.
“We advocate in relation to these matters publicly and privately, and I think yesterday I declined to do so through the media.
“But you asked me a direct question and yes, I have raised this with Dr Jaishankar, as you would anticipate.”
Senator Wong declined to give a “chapter and verse” account of what was discussed in the meeting, including Dr Jaishankar’s response.
“[But] You would anticipate in our engagement with all countries that those values form part of how we engage,” she said.
Senator Wong was in India for .
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