This week saw public recognition that relations between Canberra and Jakarta have been fully restored with the signing of a new code of conduct agreement by foreign minister Julie Bishop and her Indonesian counterpart, Marty Natalegawa.

Mr Natalegawa described the signing as marking a “very special and important day. ” Ms Bishop spoke of a “strong intelligence partnership”. Two weeks earlier the outgoing Indonesian president, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, had announced that good relations were fully restored after the hiatus caused by the claims made by US fugitive Edward Snowden that Australia had tapped the mobile phones of the president and his wife during the administration of the Labor government.

Many commentators in the media and elsewhere had forecast that the revelations would set relations back many years, and it might be interesting to play some of them back. That would be counter-productive. The question now is how will Australia-Indonesian relations fare after a new government in the leadership of the newly elected president Joko Widodo is installed in October?

This critical question was not addressed in the long interview by Tony Jones, presenter of ABC TV’s Lateline, with Mr Natalegawa. Yet the discussion on a number of complex issues, including intelligence sharing and Indonesia’s concerns about the Islamic State in the Middle East gave cause for optimism.

Mr Widodo himself has said little in public about foreign policy, but the US Foreign Policy magazine has him prominently in its list of global thinkers. There is some evidence that Indonesia will play a more active role in the United Nations in promoting a resolution to the Palestinian issue, while at the same time working against ISIS.

John McCarthy, national president of the AIIA, and a former ambassador to Indonesia, is confident that relations between the two countries will continue to repair in the coming month. But, in an interview on ABC radio, he also said there were still many serious foreign policy issues to be discussed with Indonesia, including common concerns on terrorism, changing security relationships in South East Asia, and tensions in the South China Sea. Mr McCarthy stated that what was needed with Indonesia was “a solid working relationship; not one held hostage to domestic politics.”