The following article was published in "The Guardian", newspaper of the Communist Party of Australia in its issue of Wednesday, September 25th, 2002. Contact address: 65 Campbell Street, Surry Hills. Sydney. 2010 Australia. Phone: (612) 9212 6855 Fax: (612) 9281 5795.
CPA Central Committee: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> "The Guardian": <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Webpage: http://www.cpa.org.au> Subscription rates on request. ****************************** 1. VOICES FOR PEACE In last week's parliamentary debate on war or peace in the Middle East, many spoke out for peace and condemned the warmongering and scurrilously dishonest statements of the Bush administration. We publish extracts from speeches by Senators and Carmen Lawrence MHR. Senator Hill (Liberal SA) and the Minister for Defence presented a report to the Senate on behalf of the Government. Even when faced with Iraq's announcement that it would allow weapons inspectors to return with now conditions attached, Senator Hill and other members of the Coalition parties, continued to promote the war option. Senator Hill claimed that the "return of inspectors, of itself, would provide no assurance to the international community". He went on to detail at great length the alleged manufacture of chemical, biological and even nuclear weapons by Iraq. But Senator Faulkner (Labor NSW) disputed Senator Hill's claims. He said: What have we found today? They have not got any new evidence. It is the usual doublespeak from Mr Howard: new information equals no information. The government constantly makes reference to additional intelligence material they have had in their possession, but they will not share this information with the Australian people. The information that the government presented here today has been available in every public library around the country for years. As recent polls have shown, Australia's support for a war against Iraq, particularly without UN approval, does not have the support of the Australian people. A Newspoll survey found almost 75 per cent of respondents were against a first strike on Iraq if the UN did not give approval. Australia needs a strong and consistent foreign policy that puts Australia's interests first. We need a government that is prepared to define the national interest. We need a government that is prepared to take the Australian people into its confidence and give its own independent assessment of the current situation in Iraq. We must never behave as the lap-dog of any country. When he concluded his contribution Senator Faulkner moved "that the Senate emphasises that as yet the case has not been made as would support a pre-emptive strike on Iraq; and further emphasises the vital importance of the United Nations Security Council and the United Nations Charter under international law for international dispute resolution, including in relation to Iraq". This resolution was adopted by the Senate by 38 votes to 31 with the Democrats and the Greens voting for it. Senator Brown (Greens Tasmania): We look at the all-encompassing concern that the Australian people have -- that Australia will be drawn into a war at the behest of the White House, an invasion of Iraq which will cost this country dearly in terms of resources and defence personnel and which may involve a much bigger conflagration in the Middle East with a huge toll of innocent human lives. Nor do we have a right to dictate that a billion people shall live in appalling poverty without sanitation, without food in their children's bellies, without the opportunity to a life of fulfilment. I am concerned that in this situation the United States -- not having paid its dues to [the] United Nations -- is now in a blitzkrieg on the United Nations to get it to effectively rubber-stamp this idea that there should be a regime change and nothing short of that, and an invasion of Iraq will do. During the Kuwaiti War, President Bush Senior used the picture of Iraqi soldiers in Kuwait pulling the plugs on humidicribs and killing babies. After the war that was found to be manifestly untrue. Finally, I warn the government against simply following the United States in the coming months and years. Regardless of what the United Nations does, a defiant invasion of Iraq by America and allies, including Australia, will lead to a lot of civil unrest in this country-a return to the Vietnam days. Australians feel strongly about this issue. Senator Bartlett (Democrats Queensland): No-one currently advocating the invasion of Iraq, least of all people within the current Australian government, has yet shown in any way how bombing or an invasion of any sort would achieve, or could achieve, a better state of peace in the region surrounding Iraq or indeed in the rest of the world. There is no justification unless there is clear, unrevealed evidence of an imminent attack on another nation which would justify a self-defence claim on the part of the United States or any other state. There has been no evidence, even remotely approaching or proximating that, presented to date. Legal opinion also shows that the string of UN Security Council resolutions during and since the end of the Gulf War do not continue to authorise the use of force against Iraq for having failed to fulfil its disarmament obligations under those resolutions or for any other reason. The argument that has been put forward that an attack might be legal or is presently legal under international law because it would be in self-defence is clearly wrong. That action would not be legal. Let us not forget that Iraq is not the only country with weapons of mass destruction of all sorts -- not by far. The whole issue of increasing moves towards disarmament is one that has not got the attention that it deserves. Senator Stott Despoja (Democrats SA): I still have on the Notice Paper a motion that calls for this parliament and for this government to rule out a pre-emptive strike, to get rid of the notion of first-strike action against Iraq -- and indeed in any circumstances -- for the very reasons that it contravenes international convention and law and it certainly goes against the United Nations charter. Minister Downer in his statement today said, `The Security Council will be put to the test.' Our willingness to uphold international law is also being put to the test, if we act outside the United Nations. The Australian Democrats believe that taking military action without a UN mandate is a worse threat to the authority of the United Nations and is a threat to peace. I will finish with a quote from Irene Gale of the Australian Peace Committee in South Australia, who said: When one considers that the U.S. probably holds more weapons of mass destruction than any other nation; has attacked and bombed many other countries since the end of World War II; refuses to ratify United Nations treaties such as those aimed at eliminating nuclear weapons; and refuses to allow its citizens to face an International Criminal Court, regardless of their actions, it is shocking that they take upon themselves the right to attack another nation and embroil the world in another war. Senator Wong (Labor SA): It seems to me that this government is asking the parliament and the Australian people to blindly accept a proposition that a war will bring peace and security, that going to war is a way to achieve global peace and security. The Australian people have heard this before and our experience and our knowledge of the world make us doubt the reliability of that assumption. Let us consider the proposition underlining the government's approach that we go to war in order to enhance our security. I ask the questions that many Australians are asking: how and why? Why will it enhance our security? If we bomb them into submission, will they never be able to strike back? Senator Nettle (Greens NSW): The announcement provides an opportunity for calm and rational reflection. This reflection is necessary if the international community is to continue to work together to achieve positive outcomes, rather than spout the warmongering rhetoric that we have heard from George Bush, John Howard and Alexander Downer in the last few months. For the handful of people who continue to believe that this is about September 11 or about removing dictators who possess and develop weapons of mass destruction, let the US response to today's announcement be a wake-up call: the game is up; it was never about that. All international conflicts are about strategic interests, and this is no different. It is about US strategic interests in the region and the US domestic political situation. The modern history of the Middle East has been about the US and the international community trying to dominate affairs in that region. `Regime change' is marketing jargon for putting in place a new US-friendly government. Regime change does not mean democracy, improved human rights for Iraqi civilians or stability in the Middle East; it simply means putting in place someone the United States can do business with. As part of the international community, we must urgently address global poverty, inequality and human rights abuses. It is worth restating the obvious fact that if half the money and energy that have been poured into warmongering were directed towards achieving peaceful outcomes we might already have achieved many of these solutions. This is something we should not forget when we talk about committing vast resources to the destructive course of war. The innocent citizens of Iraq have suffered not only under the dictatorship of Saddam but also through the punishment of the international community's brutal and inhumane sanctions regime. Basic infrastructure must be restored and sanctions wound back so that they are tightly focused on weapons capability. There is a serious risk that the United States, in its overwhelming dominance, will be able to persuade and coerce nations to support a course of action that is against their better judgement. We have seen here in Australia that even overwhelming opposition from the electorate will not stop a government that is determined to make its international masters happy. Dr Carmen Lawrence MHR (Fremantle) Those who advocate Australia joining in the conduct of a war against Iraq are, I believe, inviting us to participate in revenge killings. There is a cycle of never-ending bloody revenge already drenching the soil of the Middle East. It is already a site of alarming and potentially deadly instability. We know it is capable of releasing a firestorm on the rest of the world, so we should tread with caution. There is something almost comical about the prospect of George Bush waging war on another nation because that nation has defied international law. Since Bush came to office, the United States' government has torn up more international treaties and disregarded more UN conventions than the rest of the world has in 20 years. It has scuppered the biological weapons convention while experimenting, illegally, with biological weapons of its own. It has refused to grant chemical weapons inspectors full access to its laboratories, and has destroyed attempts to launch chemical inspections in Iraq. It has ripped up the anti-ballistic missile treaty, and appears to be ready to violate the nuclear test ban treaty. It has permitted CIA hit squads to recommence covert operations of the kind that included, in the past, the assassination of foreign heads of state. It has sabotaged the small arms treaty, undermined the international criminal court, refused to sign the climate change protocol and, last month, sought to immobilise the UN convention against torture so that it could keep foreign observers out of its prison camp in Guantanamo Bay. Even its preparedness to go to war with Iraq without a mandate from the UN Security Council is a defiance of international law far graver -- on the face of it -- than Saddam Hussein's non-compliance with UN weapons inspectors. I quote that because we are now at risk of a perpetual war if the hawks in the Bush administration have their way. In the Senate the Greens moved that "the Senate, opposing the use of Australian personnel in any invasion of Iraq, calls on the Australian government to: a. urge restraint on the Bush Administration and Iraq b. commit to working with the United Nations and Arabic leaders in particular to ensure Iraq abides by past UN resolutions c. use all possible influence to protect innocent Iraqi lives. The Democrats moved for an inquiry by the Senate Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade References Committee. Both these resolutions were defeated by the combined votes of the Coalition parties and the Labor Party. Senator Bob Brown commented: "This is an indictment of the Government and ALP. That they are still so open to committing Australia to an invasion of Iraq that would kill thousands of innocent Iraqis is terrifying. Australia should be playing an independent role in helping avoid war, and not acting as some kind of cheer squad to the adventurism of George Bush." *********************************************** Nelson Mandela Speaks out! In a statement blasting George Bush, Nelson Mandela said: "If Saddam has said the United Nations inspectors can come without condition, what right has he [President George Bush] to come in and say that offer is not genuine. "No country, however strong they may be is entitled to comment adversely in the way the United States has done. We must condemn this because they think they are the only power in the world. They are not. "On this question of Iraq, they are absolutely wrong. That's why I criticise most leaders all over the world for keeping quiet when one country wants to bully the whole world. "They are following a dangerous policy. I want to be a friend of the US but I'm not going to allow what they've done for me to shut my mouth. I will speak when they are wrong." ********************************************************************** Scott Ritter: Weapons inspectors manipulated In a recent interview, Scott Ritter a US citizen and a former UN weapons inspector in Iraq said: UNSCOM was manipulated by the US, especially under the lead of Richard Butler [an Australian], the second executive director of UNSCOM. From 1997-98 Butler stopped being a man objectively carrying out the will of the Security Council and became the head of a US-controlled UNSCOM, carrying out the will of the US and the UK. When you enter that kind of buddy-buddy relationship, when you become such buddies you give your buddy the green light to misuse and abuse the relationship." Quote of the year: Donald Rumsfeld US Defence Secretary: "the absence of evidence does not mean that the evidence is absent". .. -- -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Archived at http://www.cat.org.au/lists/leftlink/ Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Sub: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsub: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
