Austrlalian Government colluded with British to deny justice to Maralinga Aborigines and veterans
Independent senator for South Australia Nick Xenophon plans to step up pressure this year to ensure those affected by the nuclear tests can be compensated properly.
UK opposed compensation for Maralinga nuclear victims BRENDAN NICHOLSON DEFENCE EDITOR THE AUSTRALIAN JANUARY 01, 2014 THE Anangu Aboriginal people who inhabited the Maralinga area of South Australia called it ”puyu” or ”black mist” the dirt that rolled across the landscape and sickened, blinded and killed them.
As the Hawke government faced growing pressure for fair compensation for those affected by fallout from the British nuclear bomb test program at Maralinga and Emu fields and the Monte Bello Islands between 1952 and 1963, it ran into strong opposition from United Kingdom officials.
When cabinet considered the report of the royal commission into the British nuclear tests, Aboriginal affairs minister Clyde Holding declared that the impact on Aboriginal people shepherded off their land was catastrophic.
Holding said the plan to move Aboriginal people from the danger areas was appallingly executed.
Some of those people have since described in media reports seeing the mushroom cloud followed by a black mist that moved across their campsites leaving them vomiting, with diarrhoea and skin rashes.
Some died, some were blinded and some gave birth to deformed babies.
n a confidential report to cabinet in January 1986, then resources and energy minister Gareth Evans said British officials involved in talks on how the sites would be cleaned up and compensation paid to radiation victims argued that the UK should not be liable.
The British delegation at the talks argued that Australia had moved the goalposts with the granting of land rights to Aboriginal people and questioned the Australian objective of cleaning up Maralinga and Emu so that they’d be fit for unrestricted habitation by the Aboriginal owners.
”It is certain that no thought was given to the problem of establishing the safety of land over many thousands of years,” the report said.
The British said they believed the 15,000 Australian civilians and service personnel would generally not be successful in claiming damages if UK criteria were applied to their claims…….
Independent senator for South Australia Nick Xenophon plans to step up pressure this year to ensure those affected by the nuclear tests can be compensated properly.
”These Australian veterans were treated as human guinea pigs by the British government,” Senator Xenophon said.
”Successive Australian governments have ignored their plight and treated them with contempt.”http://www.theaustralian.com.au/in-depth/cabinet-papers/uk-opposed-compensation-for-maralinga-nuclear-victims/story-fnkuhyre-1226793123018#
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