"The worst we can do is to take this partnership for granted," Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono declared more than six years ago, when he became the first Indonesian president to address Australia's parliament in 2010.
Indonesia's hardliner military chief Gatot Nurmantyo has little love for Australia.
In the absence of the hard facts on just why Jakarta has chosen to suspend military co-operation between Indonesia and Australia, this smacks of a storm in a teacup.
From the death of David Bowie to the rise of Donald Trump to whatever you call what Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull spent the year doing, here's how Fairfax Media cartoonist David Pope captured some of the key events and issues of 2016.
Former prime minister Tony Abbott says Cory Bernardi could pick up 10 per cent of the vote and Senators in every state if he quits the Liberal party.
Once Labor and the unions stood up for battlers. Now they’re robocalling seeking sympathy for millionaires who want to stay on the pension.
Politics is an occupation increasingly concerned with personalities as much as it is with policies.
The last Newspoll for 2016 reinforced the basic political conundrum of this decade.
It started sometime between the second and third courses.
Here are a few predictions for the coming year, starting with Malcolm Turnbull losing his job.
This year, no matter which election I'm voting in, I plan to be a conviction voter.
For Malcolm Turnbull, 2016 has been a year of political compromises, dashed expectations and the occasional policy win.
Your personally curated news with six things you need to know before you get going.
Your personally curated news with six things you need to know before you get going.
The election campaign, which culminated in the nation reluctantly re-instating Malcolm Turnbull as Prime Minister, was loudly decried as too long and too boring.
Truth is, the alarming levels of distrust, cynicism, betrayal and disappointment are products of home-grown forces.
Who we are as a nation and having representatives who are one of us are closely related ideas. From now until Australia Day there will be increased reflection on these questions.
Your personally curated news with six things you need to know before you get going.
There is no good reason any sovereign Australian government – federal or state – should allow a few American for-profit businesses to dictate how much it should or shouldn't borrow (nor engage in hugely expensive ways of disguising the true extent of its liabilities).
Your personally curated news with six things you need to know before you get going.
The ratings agencies won't fall for it, and neither should you.
The political disclosure laws in Australia are a joke. They are opaque, tricky and designed to obscure the link between money and political outcomes.
Treasurer Scott Morrison loaded up the mid-year budget update with bad news in the hope that the budget itself, due in May, will appear to contain good news.
Your personally curated news with six things you need to know before you get going.
Malcolm Turnbull will play the lead role in his own re-make of Mission Impossible in 2017, complete with a cast of villains and traitors and no end of unpredictable subplots.
When people switch on the television news, or open a newspaper or website, invariably the story of the day in federal politics is reported as one politician besting the other, or putting the other in his or her place.
Our city is a light on the hill to many in the world. Yet we seem unable to see it.
Your personally curated news with six things you need to know before you get going.
Australia's tragicomedy plays on, with political instablility continuing under Malcolm Turnbull's leadership.
Hard-headed figures like Admiral Harry Harris should offset concerns that Donald Trump will be too cosy with Russia.
The hurly-burly of the 2016 election campaign, as seen through the eyes of Fairfax reporters and photographers.
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