Andrew Peacock’s secret UFO hunts with Shirley MacLaine

Ten years ago, in her tell-all book I’m Over All That And Other Confessions, she wrote of the future Liberal Leader: “I thought as long as he’s the Minister for Foreign Affairs, I might as well give him one he’ll never forget.”

She also revealed how the Victorian MP, who has died aged 82 in the US, nearly “climbed the sky” when they thought they saw a flying saucer and hinted that he had secret government information about their existence.

“My longest-lasting relationship with a political leader was with Andrew Peacock (foreign minister of Australia and Australian ambassador to the United States),” she wrote.

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“He was charming, funny and a conservative. He used his voice like a snake oil salesman, which always made me laugh because, as I told him, I was also in the business of professional seduction through voice manipulation. He took my comment good-naturedly.

“Andrew and I traveled all over the world together, as the pictures on my walls attest. He was fun as a traveling companion, and his being a foreign minister opened many doors in high places.”

But it was their UFO trip that raised eyebrows with Mr Peacock “diplomatically” indulging Ms Maclaine’s obsession with aliens.

“We traveled in Canada, France, Cambodia, Thailand,…