Spying row: Indonesia threatens to stop co-operating on people smuggling

The Indonesian foreign minister, Marty Natalegawa, has escalated the diplomatic row between Australia and Indonesia after revelations about Australia's intelligence gathering activities by suggesting co-operation on people smuggling operations may be reviewed.

Natalegawa made the comments in a press conference on Monday. Guardian Australia reported at the weekend that Australia was spying on Indonesia at the UN climate change conference in 2007, according documents obtained by the whistleblower Edward Snowden.

Last week Fairfax Media used documents leaked to German news magazine Der Spiegel by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden to show that Australia was gathering intelligence from listening posts across the Asia-Pacific region.

When he was questioned about what action Indonesia would take against Australia, the foreign minister said: “One of them obviously is the agreement to exchange information, exchange even intelligence information, in fact, to address the issue of people smuggling."

"If Australia feels that there are ways of obtaining information other than the official one then one wonders where we are in terms of co-operation."

"Enough is enough," Dr Natalegawa said. "The recent revelations will have a potentially damaging impact in terms of the trust and confidence between countries concerned."

Indonesia summoned the Australian ambassador, Greg Moriarty, and US officials to the foreign ministry last week to explain the revelations. Natalegawa had also sought explanation from Australian foreign minister Julie Bishop during a meeting in Perth on Friday.

But Natalegawa said on Monday he was not satisfied with either of the explanations offered by Bishop or Moriarty. "The kind of response that we've been obtaining or receiving is the more generic response that neither the government of Australia nor the United States is able to confirm or deny the practices reported in the various media," he said.

Natalegawa’s comments come just days after the immigration minister, Scott Morrison, arrived back in Australia from a trip to Indonesia where he met Dr Amir Syamsuddin, Indonesia's minister for law and human rights, to discuss people smuggling operations.

At his weekly press conference last Friday Morrison told reporters: "Australia and Indonesia have a shared interest in resolving this problem that is not of Indonesia's making yet whose co-operation along with our other regional partners is critical to resolving it.

"We have opened a new phase in our co-operation with Indonesia and I am extremely optimistic about what will be achieved in the weeks, months and years ahead."

Natalegawa said last Friday that the spying revelations were “not cricket” and he had sought clarification about Australia’s involvement with the foreign affairs minister, Julie Bishop.