Fed: Howard condemns racial violence in Sydney

AAP General News (Australia)
12-12-2005
Fed: Howard condemns racial violence in Sydney

SYDNEY, Dec 12 AAP - Attacking people on their basis of their race is totally unacceptable,
Prime Minister John Howard says.

But Mr Howard today refused to call Australians racist following the mob violence in
Sydney yesterday.

He condemned incidents in which up to 5,000 people descended on North Cronulla Beach,
chanting racist slogans and attacking people of Middle Eastern appearance.

The violence sparked apparent reprisal attacks late last night, with cars damaged at
Maroubra Beach.

"Mob violence is always sickening," Mr Howard told reporters.

"Attacking people on the basis of their race, their appearance, their ethnicity, is
totally unacceptable and should be repudiated by all Australians irrespective of their
own background and their politics," he said.

"I believe yesterday's behaviour was completely unacceptable but I'm not going to put
a general tag (of) racism on the Australian community.

"I think it's a term that is flung around sometimes carelessly and I'm simply not going
to do so."

Mr Howard also dismissed any suggestion his government's warnings about home-grown
terrorists had fuelled the rampage.

"It is impossible to know how individuals react but everything this government's said
about home-grown terrorism has been totally justified," Mr Howard told reporters in Sydney.

"It is a potential threat. To suggest that one should remain silent ... knowing what
I know because that might antagonise someone else is a complete failure of leadership."

Mr Howard said he fully supported the actions of police at Cronulla and anybody who
broke the law yesterday or on the previous weekend, when two lifeguards and a camera crew
were assaulted, should be apprehended and prosecuted.

Mr Howard warned anyone considering further violent behaviour they would face the full
force of the law.

"Nobody in this country has a right to take the law into their own hands.

"It applied to the behaviour of people yesterday, it applied to the behaviour of people
on the beach the previous weekend.

"Any action the NSW Police take in response to that has my full support."

AAP smb/kaf/nf/sp/lb/sd

KEYWORD: SURF HOWARD

2005 AAP Information Services Pty Limited (AAP) or its Licensors.