Tony Burke due to speak in Brisbane
Donald Trump’s dramatic announcement about the granting by Australia of asylum to five Iranian women footballers was the big breaking news of the night.
Trump said he had spoken to Anthony Albanese who had told him the news but added that other members of the team felt they had to return home.
We are expecting Tony Burke, the home affairs minister, to give a statement about the women shortly in Brisbane, when we can hope that he will clarify the situation.
In the meantime, here’s our news story:
Key events
Tony Burke has posted a picture meeting the five Iranian women’s soccer team players who will now live in Australia with humanitarian visas.
The government announced this morning it had been working with the players and security agencies over several days to grant them asylum.
Burke quickly took to social media to spread the good news (and post the obligatory ‘signing the important document photo’).
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PM says superannuation reforms will pass the Senate this week
After reaching agreement from the Greens to pass their watered superannuation reforms, the prime minister, ending his press conference, says the bill will now pass the Senate this week.
It will assist income earners, but it will make the superannuation system more progressive and I thank the majority of the Senate for agreeing to what is a very sensible reform.
You can read more about that bill, and the three-year journey to get to this point here:
PM tight-lipped on other details from Trump call
Despite providing some details on the phone call between himself and Donald Trump regarding the Iranian women’s, the PM tries to dodge subsequent questions.
My colleague, Tom McIlroy, asks Albanese – who last week called for de-escalation in the region – whether he communicated that call to Trump.
Albanese is short, and says “I refer you to previous answers.”
Another journalist asks Albanese if he sought assurances from the US president that the war was drawing to a close, and again receives the same answer from the PM.
Albanese adds:
When I get off the phone and I don’t hold a press conference and talk about all of the details.
But the PM did call a press conference following that call and did already give us some of the details.
Albanese emphasises Australian involvement is purely defence: ‘We are not protagonists’
The government has been at pains to say that Australia is only providing defence capability, and is not participating in any offensive action against Iran.
The deployment of the Australian military surveillance aircraft, the government has said, was at the request of the UAE.
Earlier Richard Marles confirmed 85 Australian personnel would be deployed with the E-7 Wedgetail aircraft, which he said was the “normal crew”.
Albanese says:
Our involvement is purely defensive, and it’s in defence of Australians who are in the region, as well as in defence of our friends in the United Arab Emirates, who are good friends of Australia and Australians, we have a free trade agreement with them that’s opened up the markets of the Middle East.
PM says Trump called ‘just before 2am’
Albanese says he spoke to Donald Trump early this morning, ahead of the US president taking to his social media platform Truth Social to report Australia was granting asylum to the five Iranian women’s football players.
The prime minister says he doesn’t reveal details of private conversations but that Trump was concerned about the welfare of the team, and adds that the discussion between the two was “very positive”.
President Trump rang me this morning, just before 2am we had a very positive discussion. He was concerned about the Iranian women in the soccer team and their welfare and their safety if they returned home, he conveyed that to me. I was able to convey to him the action that we’d undertaken over the previous 48 hours, and that five of the team had asked for assistance and had received it and were safely located.
Asked later by another journalist whether the PM discussed anything further on military deployments with Trump, Albanese doesn’t give much away:
It was a raw conversation between myself and President Trump, primarily about the Iranian soccer set. But obviously we also discussed broad events.
Bowen says diesel supply arriving in Australia ‘as expected’
Following Wong, the energy minister, Chris Bowen, warns Australians again to not panic buy petrol, and tries to assure the public that the country has enough fuel stock.
He says Australia has 32 days of reserve petrol.
My key message is that every single expected arrival diesel supply in recent days and expected in coming days and weeks has arrived on schedule as expected, so there is no need for panic buying.
While there are challenges and uncertainties in all international supply chains at the moment, the preparations that the government has put in place for the minimum stock obligation are working. If it’s necessary to access those minimum supplies, we will, but we’re not there at this point.
Bowen says he has a great deal of empathy for farmers concerned about supply chains but says, “This is managing a huge spike in demand, not an impact on supply at this point.”
Wong issues flight update, warns ‘security situation deteriorating’
Wong says the government is working “around the clock” to help the tens of thousands of Australians to evacuate the region.
She says 27,000 flights to and from the Middle East have been cancelled since 28 February.
Australian consular officials are on the ground to help Australians, and Wong says 2,600 Australians have now returned from the Middle East on commercial flights.
She adds that Qatar has begun allowing limited commercial flights out.
There are many more Australians still in the Middle East and we do understand these are difficult decisions for Australians and their families.
The security situation is deteriorating and it is likely to get worse before it gets better. We’ve also been focused on trying to offer options to Australians where no flights were involved.
Military aircraft deployed at the request of the UAE: Marles
All the bigwigs are at this press conference. After Albanese, the deputy PM and defence minister Richard Marles addresses the media, and confirms that the deployment of the E-7 Wedgetail was at the request of the United Arab Emirates.
Marles says that surveillance aircraft is “one of the leading capabilities in terms of airborne, long-range reconnaissance and command”.
The airframe will be leaving Australia today, and the expectation is that it will be in the region in the middle of the week and operational by the end of the week. We have also received a request from the UAE to supply advanced, medium-range air missiles and ramps, and we will be supplying a number of those to the UAE.
Marles emphasises again that the aircraft is being deployed in a defensive capacity to protect Gulf nations under attack from Iran.
‘If you want our help, help is here’: Albanese
Albanese says the government has preparing for some time to provide support for the Iranian women’s football team, who have been playing in Australia in the Women’s Asian Cup.
The home affairs minister, Tony Burke, confirmed this morning that five have been given humanitarian visas.
The prime minister says the government will provide support if other players also want to seek asylum.
We’ve been preparing for this for some time. Indeed, the minister for home affairs, Tony Burke, travelled to Queensland on Sunday, returned and then travelled again last night. Australians have been moved by the plight of these brave women.
They’re safe here, and they should feel at home here. The AFP have had plans in place with Commissioner Krissy Barrett directly involved, and once it was made clear that these women wanted assistance, the Australian police moved them to assist to a safe location where they remain.
We’re willing to provide assistance to other women in the team, noting that this is a very delicate situation, and it is up to them, but we say to them, if you want our help, help is here, and we will provide that.
Australia will deploy aircraft and air-to-air missiles to Gulf to protect civilians
The prime minister, speaking to reporters in Canberra, has said the government will deploy a E-7A Wedgetail, a military surveillance plane, as 12 countries face attacks from Iran in the region.
Anthony Albanese says the United Arab Emirates alone has already been forced to shoot down over 1,500 drones and rockets.
Albanese says again that the deployment will be in a defensive, not an offensive capacity.
We’re taking defensive action to support our partners efforts to keep Australians safe, deployed ADF assets will operate according to the right of collective self-defence.
Australia will deploy an E-7 Wedgetail to the Gulf to help protect and defend Australians and other civilians, the Wedgetail will provide long-range reconnaissance capability, which will help to protect and secure the airspace above the Wedgetail and supporting Australian defence force personnel will be deployed for an initial four weeks in support of the collective self-defence of Gulf nations.
Duniam welcomes humanitarian visas for Iranian football players
The shadow home affairs minister, Jonathon Duniam, has welcomed the government’s announcement that it will offer asylum to five women on the Iranian football team in Australia.
On Sky News, Duniam says it’s a “good” outcome, and that he’d spoken with Tony Burke several times over the weekend.
He says he hopes more of the Iranian women’s football team make the same decision to seek asylum in Australia. Asked whether US president Donald Trump “drove” the outcome, Duniam says:
I do know that the government were actively working on this for a number of days in relation to the pressures that these women were probably facing and what we as a country would think is right. So I don’t think he’s driven it. I think that despite the radio silence and the minister outlined why there wasn’t a running commentary on this, and I think it is reasonable.
