I

ndonesia warmly welcomes the election of Tony Abbott as the next Australian prime minister. He is no stranger here since he has visited Jakarta and met with various Indonesian leaders in the past few years in his capacity
as leader of the opposition. So sure was he about taking over the premiership that last year he promised that Indonesia would be the first foreign country he would visit upon taking office. We have no reason not to believe in his sincerity.

Indonesia is no stranger to the changes of guard in Canberra. Since 2004, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has dealt with John Howard, Kevin Rudd, Julia Gillard and then Rudd again.

He maintained warm and cordial relationships with each of them. He will get along fine with Abbott. We can only ask that Abbott, or whoever is in charge in Canberra, extends the same courtesy to whoever replaces Yudhoyono in October 2014.

While the relationship between our two leaders is important, it should not be the defining factor in the bilateral ties between the two countries. Indonesia and Australia have moved on from the time when ties were defined by one single issue like Timor Leste, or by the intimate ties that former prime minister Paul Keating formed with then president Soeharto.

Our relations have not only deepened in the last 15 years, but have also become broader.

They are defined by the common interests of two large neighboring countries.

Differences will remain given our very different cultural backgrounds and historical paths, but they are far outweighed by our shared interests and most importantly shared values and principles as two democratic nations. A warm and cordial relationship between our leaders is simply the icing on the cake.

Now that Abbott is in power, he will have to give up the whacky campaign promises about cracking down on human traffickers, such as sending the Australian police into Indonesian villages to chase after culprits or buying up all the boats from their owners.

We understand that such ideas meant winning a few votes here and there, after all Howard, Rudd and Gillard all did the same.

But once Abbott is in power, he will have to sit down and talk with Indonesia about what the two countries can do together.

May the spirit of neighborliness and cooperation continue to thrive.