In November 1941, as concerns about war with the Japanese in the Pacific grew, the Thai minister of justice, Thamrong Navasawat, met the Australian prime minister, Robert Gordon Menzies, in Canberra during a goodwill tour of the British Empire in Asia. This meeting was designed to assure the government of Australia of Thailand's neutrality. The British had been pressing the Australians to establish a legation in Bangkok, but the latter still preferred that their interests be represented by Westminster. On 8 December, the Japanese invaded Thailand and the Thais quickly accepted Japanese terms for the transit of their armies. On 21 December, Thailand signed a broad military alliance with Japan. The Allied bombing of Thailand had already begun when, on 25 January 1942, the Thai government declared war on Britain and the United States. While the latter refused to accept the action as a free one and did not regard Thailand as other than an occupied country, Britain responded in kind. Since Australia then had no representation in Bangkok, Canberra asked the Swiss to inform the Thai government on 2 March that it had declared war on Thailand. There was no response, and the Thais claimed after the war that they had no intention of going to war with Australia and were unaware of the convention that Australia was at war whenever Britain was. There were only eleven Thai persons in Australia at the time, and all were watched by the Security Service of the Commonwealth Investigations Branch. Some Australians, mostly employees of the tin mines, were interned along with the British in Thailand.