Melbourne, March 11: Foreign minister Kevin Rudd says Australia is doubling financial assistance for refugees flooding into Tunisia from Libya.
Australia had committed over $US6 million ($5.95 million) to UN agencies, and “later today I will have virtually doubled that assistance”, Mr Rudd said in Tunisia overnight.
During the visit – the first by an Australian foreign minister to the North African country – Mr Rudd discussed food security, education, employment and electoral assistance, as Tunisia plans for a democratic future after a popular revolt ended the rule of dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.
Mr Rudd said the world needed to “support Tunisia in social and economic and electoral terms in this period of transition”.
Meanwhile, there is growing concern in Australia over Mr Rudd’s “freewheeling” style in his public remarks about Libya.
Mr Rudd advocates a no-fly zone, while Prime Minister Julia Gillard has no intention of taking an active part in one.
An adviser to Ms Gillard, who asked not to be named, told The Age newspaper Mr Rudd’s freewheeling approach was also causing confusion at a diplomatic level.
——–Agencies