At next week’s UN General Assembly, Malcolm Turnbull will be among many leaders responding to the large movements of refugees and migrants across the world. Peter Jennings, executive director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, tells Michelle Grattan that the purpose of Barack Obama’s meeting is to get other countries to accept more refugees through legal channels.

“I don’t think he’s going to make much headway because at the moment the Europeans are closing their doors rather than opening them. But I wouldn’t be surprised if we see significant pledges of new aid and Australia will probably be doing the same thing at that meeting,” he says.

While Turnbull is in the US, he will take part in a dialogue on cyber security. Jennings, who is head of one of the think tanks sponsoring the talks, says the idea is to see if they can find ways to more effectively link business into a discussion about cyber security, including on issues like counter-radicalisation.

“I think what the hope is is that we’ll see closer Australia-US cooperation emerging not only in government but also between business entities as well.”

Full PodCast here: http://michellegrattan.podbean.com/e/politics-podcast-peter-jennings-on-turnbull%E2%80%99s-trip-to-the-us/ 

Peter Jennings is Executive Director of the Australian Strategic Studies Institute. 

Originally published: The Conversation Podcasts. 16 September 2016