Ivan Quail’s Submission – a devastating fact-filled critique of the costly, dangerous unhealthy nuclear industry.
One year of operation of a single, large nuclear power plant, generates as much of longpersisting radioactive poisons as one thousand Hiroshima-types atomic bombs. There is no way the electric power can be generated in nuclear plants without generating the radioactive poisons.
France’s troubled nuclear fleet a bigger problem for Europe than Russia gas. France caps its consumer power bills – to maintain the myth of “cheap” nuclear and to protect French pride .
In 100,000 years’ time the planet would still not have recovered from Mayak, Chernobyl, Doenreagh, Hanford, Rocky flats, Marshall Islands, Montebello, Maralinga and Fukushima; to name a few.
Average life expectancy in Ukraine and Belarus has REDUCED 4 yrs to age 68. Each year 6000 babies are born with “Chernobyl Heart” Half of them die! Children born since 1986 are affected by a 200 percent increase in birth defects and a 250 percent increase in congenital birth deformities.• 85 percent of Belarusian children are deemed to be Chernobyl victims. UNICEF found increases in children’s disease rates, including 38 percent increase in malignant tumours, 43 percent in blood circulatory illnesses and 63 percent in disorders of the bone, muscle and connective tissue system.
Environment and Other Legislation Amendment (Removing Nuclear Energy Prohibitions) Bill 2022
Submission No 61 [This submission contains numerous links which are all visible on the original, but not all here]
A few words about myself on this issue. I have been studying the Uranium fuel cycle,
nuclear energy and the biological and genetic effects of radiation for over 40 years. I
have read a dozen or more books and hundreds of scientific and medical papers on
the topics.
AUKUS nuclear subs deal should torpedo Kimba radioactive waste plan.
23 Mar 23, A new federal government process to identify a site for the disposal of high-level radioactive waste from future nuclear submarines should signal the end of the push for a national radioactive waste facility at Kimba on SA’s Eyre Peninsula, environmentalists say.
The Australian Conservation Foundation yesterday joined with peak state group Conservation SA to deliver a petition from 10,000 people calling on Resources Minister Madeleine King to ‘stop the double-handling and relocation of radioactive waste to a highly contested facility proposed near Kimba.’
Defence Minister Richard Marles has announced the search for a new site to store high level radioactive waste will commence next year.
“It makes no sense to have multiple federal processes in train seeking to find sites to store and dispose of radioactive waste,” said ACF nuclear policy analyst Dave Sweeney.
“The federal nuclear regulator has stated existing intermediate level waste can be securely managed at the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisations (ANSTO) Lucas Heights facility for ‘decades to come’.
“This waste should be kept at ANSTO and moved only when a future site has been selected for high-level waste.
“This would avoid unnecessary duplication, cost and risk and would recognise and respect the clear opposition of the Barngarla Traditional Owners to the current waste plan.”
Federal government ministers have repeatedly said AUKUS is a game-changer. ACF is calling for the government to demonstrate this in relation to radioactive waste management by changing the present deficient and divisive waste game around Kimba.
“Against the backdrop of escalating cost and complexity associated with future AUKUS waste it makes no sense to maintain a politicised and piecemeal approach to radioactive waste management in Australia”.
Watch New Barngarla video calling for an end to the Kimba proposal:
Some Labor and Independent members of parliament not happy with AUKUS nuclear submarine deal
Above – Labor MP Josh Wilson not happy about the nuclear submarine deal
Labor’s old guard follow Keating into the trenches over $368b submarine deal The Age, 22 Mar 23
KEY POINTS
- Kim Carr has called AUKUS a “huge leap into the dark”, joining other high-profile Labor members in criticising the deal.
- Labor MP Josh Wilson told Parliament that Australia is yet to solve the problem of dealing with radioactive waste.
- Teal independents have raised concerns over nuclear proliferation and how AUKUS will be funded.
Former federal cabinet minister Kim Carr has joined Labor colleagues in raising deep concerns about the AUKUS pact after federal MPs questioned the deal in parliament and some party members sought to mobilise against the decades-long commitment.
Carr voiced doubts about the $368 billion cost of the agreement on nuclear-powered submarines as well as the strategic risk of a “forward defence” policy that he compared to the approach that drew Australia into the Vietnam War in the 1960s.
The comments intensify the row over the sweeping defence plan after former prime minister Paul Keating, former foreign minister Bob Carr and former foreign minister Gareth Evans challenged it with opinions ranging from ferocious criticism to cautious doubt.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese backed the defence policy in the regular Labor caucus meeting in Parliament House on Tuesday after three MPs raised questions about its cost, the concerns from voters about Australian sovereignty and the need for 20,000 workers to complete the task.
But Kim Carr, who held portfolios such as industry and defence materiel during the Rudd and Gillard governments and left parliament at the last election, said AUKUS was a “huge leap into the dark” that depended heavily on the United States.
“The fundamental question is whether this is the best use of $368 billion of public money in defence of Australia,” he said.
“I don’t believe the question has been answered. And I am deeply concerned about a revival of a forward defence policy, given our performance in Vietnam, so there are several levels on which we should question this plan more closely.
“Given it’s 20 years since Iraq, you can hardly say our security agencies should not be questioned when they provide their assessments.”
The growing public debate highlights the unrest within the party membership and the test for Albanese in shoring up support from Labor voters who may shift support to the Greens after the smaller party came out strongly against AUKUS.
Bob Carr, who was premier of NSW for a decade before serving as foreign minister in the Gillard government, also expressed concern about the way the AUKUS agreement could take Australia into a conflict alongside the United States.
“I want upheld the notion that even under ANZUS, there should be no assumption of Australian engagement,” he said.
Last Friday, former Gillard government environment minister Peter Garrett voiced his own objections to the deal, saying in a social media post that “AUKUS stinks”……..
Western Australian Labor MP Josh Wilson aired his concerns on the floor of Parliament on Monday night by saying Australia was yet to solve the problem of low-level radioactive waste, let alone the waste from a future fleet with nuclear reactors
…………………………….. members of the crossbench expressed concerns about the implications.
“I’m concerned about the cost/benefit analysis of AUKUS and the risk of losing sovereignty over Australian defence resources,” said Zali Steggall, the member for Warringah.
Zoe Daniel, the member for Goldstein, said constituents had been in touch about the major shift in Australia’s strategic approach.
“On their behalf, I will be seeking to understand whether such an unequivocal and long-term alignment with the United States is in Australia’s best interest,” she said.
Kylea Tink, the member for North Sydney, said she was worried about nuclear proliferation and Sophie Scamps, the member for Mackellar, said she wanted more information about funding.
“The Albanese government needs to explain to the Australian people how it intends to pay for this program,” she said. “The vulnerable should not be sacrificed to pay for this additional budgetary spending.” https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/labor-s-old-guard-follow-keating-into-the-trenches-over-368b-submarine-deal-20230321-p5cu1h.html
Guardian Essential Poll: AUKUS support collapses, 3-in-4 oppose
The cacophony of media, think tank, and political voices cabal haven’t yet convinced the Australian public of the need to rush into war alongside the US. But if the trend in opinion on our previous disastrous policy of following the Americans is any guide it is very likely that a majority of Australians will rate a war over Taiwan as a big mistake.
Pearls and Irritations, By Noel TurnbullMar 23, 2023
Reflecting the diminishing public support for the AUKUS deal, a new Guardian Essential Poll has found that only one quarter of Australians support paying the $368bn price tag to acquire nuclear submarines. For decades Australians were gung ho about going to war – almost any war. Today – despite the best efforts of the Nine Media (Peter Hartcher in particular) and other media – they are now far more hesitant.
Indeed, an analysis of community opinion from the start of the Vietnam war to the likelihood of war over Taiwan, shows hesitancy translates into opposition the longer the war lasts…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
Now we face another possible war – this time with China – and it is worth examining what both Australians and Taiwanese think of that prospect.
In June 2021 the Lowy Institute’s annual poll showed that, for the first time, more Australians view China as a security threat than an economic partner, despite the country remaining Australia’s biggest trading partner.
In June 2022 the Lowy Institute found that the majority of Australians (56%) said China was ‘more to blame’ for the tensions than Australia while 38% said Australia and China were equally to blame. Just 4% said Australia was more to blame.
A slim majority of the 2022 respondents (52%) viewed a potential military conflict between the US and China as a critical threat to Australia’s interests over the coming decade. But the poll also showed the public wants to avoid being dragged into war. More than half those polled (57%) said that in such a conflict “Australia should remain neutral”. Some 41% said Canberra should support the US and 1% said it should support China.
The Lowy study showed the public also had strong views on our relations with the US and China policy with 77% agreeing with the statement: “Australia’s alliance with the United States makes it more likely Australia will be drawn into a war in Asia that would not be in Australia’s interests” – up eight points since 2019.
As for the US-Australian motivation for the next war, Taiwan, opinion there has been developing in strange ways. According to an Economist special report on Taiwan (11 March 2023) in 1992 only 17.3% the Taiwan population identified as Taiwanese compared with 25.5% as Chinese and 4.4% as both. By 2022 a National Chengchi University study found 61% of respondents identifying as Taiwanese, 2.7% as Chinese and 46.4% as both.
Polls indicate that more than half of Taiwanese support the status quo of de facto independence and don’t have a lot of faith in whether the US would support them against a Chinese invasion with the Taiwan Public Opinion Foundation finding that between 2021 and 2022 confidence in whether America would send troops to defend Taiwan against an invasion fell from 65% to 34.4%. They were actually more confident of Japanese support than American.
Meanwhile we wait to see what the next substantial polls say about the Albanese Government and Taiwan. We know from Vietnam to Iraq Australians start off by opposing the proposed wars; support them when troops are actually fighting; and, then begin to oppose them as the promised victory doesn’t eventuate.
This new potential war is on a scale, though, which makes Vietnam and Iraq seem insignificant.
The cacophony of media, think tank, and political voices cabal haven’t yet convinced the Australian public of the need to rush into war alongside the US. But if the trend in opinion on our previous disastrous policy of following the Americans is any guide it is very likely that a majority of Australians will rate a war over Taiwan as a big mistake.
It may also be an indicator of how attitudes to the Aukus deal might evolve. A Guardian Essential poll in 2021 disclosed Australians’ worries that the project would strain relations with China and Europe…………………….. https://johnmenadue.com/guardian-essential-poll-aukus-support-collapses-3-in-4-oppose/
PM flags nuclear prohibition treaty still on agenda despite AUKUS subs deal
Anthony Albanese has signalled Labor still plans to sign an international treaty on nuclear weapons amid concerns about the AUKUS deal.
Catie McLeod, news.com.au 23 Mar 23
Anthony Albanese has signalled Labor still plans to sign a treaty prohibiting nuclear weapons amid concerns the AUKUS submarine deal will breach Australia’s international obligations on the issue.
Under the trilateral security agreement with the United States and the UK, Australia will become the first non-nuclear weapon state to acquire nuclear-powered submarines by seeking an exemption from the International Atomic Energy Agency.
The government has said the submarines will only use nuclear propulsion and would not have nuclear weapons.
Despite this iron-clad assurance, some countries in the Indo-Pacific have raised concerns the submarine deal is a breach of Australia’s existing nuclear non-proliferation treaty obligations, and that it might stop it from ratifying an additional treaty prohibiting nuclear weapons.
Australia made a binding commitment to never acquire nuclear weapons when it ratified the international treaty on non-proliferation 50 years ago but it is yet to sign or ratify a newer treaty created in 2017 that binds member countries to outlawing nuclear weapons all together.
Labor first committed to signing and ratifying the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons at its National Conference in 2018 and reaffirmed that commitment in 2022.
Speaking in parliament on Wednesday, the Prime Minister said Labor would stick with the commitment and said Australia’s clear position was that a world without nuclear weapons “would be a very good thing”.
“We don’t acquire them ourselves, we wish that they weren’t there,” Mr Albanese said after independent Goldstein MP Zoe Daniel asked him if Labor would sign the nuclear prohibition treaty.
“We will do is we will work systematically and methodically through the issues and in accordance with the commitments that were made in the national platform.”…………………. https://www.news.com.au/national/breaking-news/pm-flags-nuclear-prohibition-treaty-still-on-agenda-despite-aukus-subs-deal/news-story/f73813339997b2ca7efaaa8323813f0d
Britain supplying depleted uranium rounds to Ukraine
The UK will send “armour piercing rounds which contain depleted
uranium” to Ukraine, for use with the tank squadron donated by the
British army. Defence minister Baroness Goldie made the admission yesterday
in response to a written parliamentary question from crossbench peer Lord
Hylton. Goldie said: “Such rounds are highly effective in defeating
modern tanks and armoured vehicles.” Russia has previously warned it
would regard the use of depleted uranium in Ukraine as a ‘dirty bomb’.
Declassified UK 21st March 2023
Putin threatens response over Britain’s toxic tank shells.
Times 21st March 2023
Iraqi children with congenital disabilities caused by depleted uranium
Iraqi Kids Test Positive for Depleted Uranium Remnants Near Former US Air Base, https://truthout.org/articles/iraqi-children-test-positive-for-depleted-uranium-near-former-us-air-base/Mike Ludwig, September 19, 2019 For the first time, independent researchers have found that the bodies of Iraqi children born with congenital disabilities, such as heart disease and malformed limbs, near a former United States air base in southern Iraq are contaminated with high levels of radioactive heavy metals associated with toxic depleted uranium pollution leftover from the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.
The findings appear to bolster claims made by Iraqi doctors who observed high rates of congenital disabilities in babies born in areas that experienced heavy fighting during the bloody first year of the most recent Iraq war.
In 2016, researchers tested the hair and teeth of children from villages in proximity to the Talil Air Base, a former U.S. air base, located south of Baghdad and near the city Nasiriyah. They found elevated levels of uranium and of thorium, two slightly radioactive heavy metals linked to cancer and used to make nuclear fuel.
Thorium is a direct decay product of depleted uranium, a chemically toxic byproduct of the nuclear power industry that was added to weapons used during the first year of the war in Iraq. Thanks to its high density, depleted uranium can reinforce tank armor and allow bullets and other munitions to penetrate armored vehicles and other heavy defenses. Depleted uranium was also released into the environment from trash dumps and burn pits outside U.S. military bases.
Mozhgan Savabieasfahani, an independent researcher based in Michigan and a co-author of the study, said that levels of thorium in children born with congenital disabilities near the Talil Air Base were up to 28 times higher than in a control group of children who were born without congenital disabilities and live much further away.
“We are basically seeing a depleted uranium footprint on these children,” Savabieasfahani said in an interview.
Using statistical analysis, the researchers also determined that living near the air base was associated with an increased risk of giving birth to a child with congenital disabilities, including congenital heart disease, spinal deformations, cleft lip and missing or malformed and paralyzed limbs. The results of the study will soon be published in the journal Environmental Pollution, where the authors argue more research is needed to determine the extent that toxins left behind after the U.S.-led war and occupation are continuing to contaminate and sicken the Iraqi population.
For years following the 2003 U.S-led invasion, Iraqi doctors raised alarms about increasing numbers of babies being born with congenital disabilities in areas of heavy fighting. Other peer-reviewed studies found dramatic increases in child cancer, leukemia, miscarriages and infant mortality in cities such as Fallujah, which saw the largest battles of the war. Scientists, Iraqi physicians and international observers have long suspected depleted uranium to be the culprit. In 2014, one Iraqi doctor told Truthout reporter Dahr Jamail that depleted uranium pollution amounted to “genocide.”
The U.S. government provided Iraq’s health ministry with data to track depleted uranium contamination but has said it would be impossible to identify all the material used during wartime. War leaves behind a variety of potentially toxic pollutants, and some researchers have cast doubt on the connection between depleted uranium and congenital disabilities, noting that Iraq has faced a number environmental problems in recent decades. However, political manipulation was suspected to have skewed results of at least one study, a survey of congenital disabilities released by the World Health Organization and the Iraqi government in 2013 that contradicted claims made by Iraqi doctors.
While the authors caution that more research is needed, by identifying the presence of thorium in the teeth and hair of Iraqi children born with congenital disabilities near the Talil Air Base, the latest studies draw direct links to depleted uranium and the U.S. military.
“Baby teeth are highly sensitive to environmental exposures,” said Savabieasfahani. “Such high levels of thorium simply suggest high exposure at an early age and potentially in utero.”
Up to 2,000 metric tons of depleted uranium entered the Iraqi environment in 2003, mostly from thousands of rounds fired by the U.S., according to United Nations estimates. Depleted uranium munitions were also fired by U.S. forces in Iraq, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia during the Persian Gulf War in 1993. Researchers and veterans have long suspected that depleted uranium could be a potential cause of Gulf War syndrome, a wide range of harmful symptoms experienced by thousands of service members for years after the war.
The U.S. has also imported thousands of tons of military equipment into Iraq, including tanks, trucks, bombers, armored vehicles, infantry weapons, antiaircraft systems, artillery and mortars – some of which were coated with depleted uranium. Much of this equipment eventually found its way into military junkyards, dozens of which remain scattered near former U.S. military bases and other installations across country.
Depleted uranium was also stored at U.S. military bases and was known to leak into the environment. The Talil Air Base, which served as a focal point for the new study, is only one of dozens of sites across Iraq where the U.S. military is believed to have left a highly toxic legacy.
“What we see here, and what we imply with this study, is that we could see this very same scenario around every single U.S. military base in Iraq,” Savabieasfahani said. “The exposure of pregnant mothers to the pollutions of war, including uranium and thorium, irreversibly damages their unborn children.”
In 2013, international observers reported that between 300 and 365 sites with depleted uranium contamination were identified by Iraqi authorities in the years following the 2003 U.S. invasion, with an estimated cleanup cost of $30 million to $45 million. In some cases, military junk contaminated with depleted uranium was being sold as scrap metal, spreading the contamination further. At one scrap site, children were seen climbing and playing on contaminated scrap metal.
Savabieasfahani, who has researched military pollution across Iraq, said the violence of war continues through pollution long after the carnage ends and the troops come home. Dropping tons of bombs and releasing millions of bullets leaves toxic residues in the air, water and soil of the “targeted population,” poisoning the landscape – and the people — for generations. Of course, U.S. war making in Iraq has not ended. The U.S. military continues to train Iraqi security forces and lead a coalition that carried out airstrikes against ISIS (also known as Daesh) insurgents in Iraq as recently as last week.
“The U.S. must be held responsible and forced to clean up all the sites which it has polluted. Technology exists for the cleanup of radiation contamination,” Savabieasfahani said. “The removal and disposal of U.S.-created military junkyards would go a long way toward cleaning toxic releases out of the Iraqi environment.”
The U.N. Internal Law Commission is currently circulating 24 draft principles urging governments to protect the environment from the ravages of war. In July, an international group of scientists renewed calls for a Fifth Geneva Convention that would establish an international treaty declaring environmental destruction a war crime under international law. While a Fifth Geneva convention on environmental war crimes would be significant, it would not ensure accountability for the U.S., which routinely shields itself from international prosecution for its war crimes.
Imperial Visits: US Emissaries in the Pacific
Australian Independent Media Binoy Kampmark 19 Mar 23
For some time, Washington has been losing its spunk in the Pacific. When it comes to the Pacific Islands, a number have not fallen – at least entirely – for the rhetoric that Beijing is there to take, consume, and dominate all. Nor have such countries been entirely blind to their own sharpened interests. This largely aqueous region, which promises to submerge them in the rising waters of climate change, has become furiously busy.
A number of officials are keen to push the line that Washington’s policy towards the Pacific is clearly back where it should be. It’s all part of the warming strategy adopted by the Biden administration, typified by the US-Pacific Island Country summit held last September. In remarks made during the summit, President Joe Biden stated that “the security of America, quite frankly, and the world, depends on your security and the security of the Pacific Islands. And I really mean that.”
Not once was China mentioned, but its ghostly presence stalked Biden’s words. A new Pacific Partnership Strategy was announced, “the first national US strategy for [the] Pacific Islands.” Then came the promised cash: some $810 million in expanded US programs including more than $130 million in new investments to support, among other things, climate resilience, buffer the states against the impact of climate change and improve food security.
The Pacific Islands have also seen a flurry of recent visits. In January this year, US Indo-Pacific military commander Admiral John Aquilino popped into Papua New Guinea to remind the good citizens of Port Moresby that the eyes of the US were gazing benignly upon them. It was his first to the country, and the public affairs unit of the US Indo-Pacific Command stated that it underscored “the importance of the US-Papua New Guinea relationship” and showed US resolve “toward building a more peaceful, stable, and prosperous Indo-Pacific region.”
In February, a rather obvious strategic point was made in the reopening of the US embassy in the Solomon Islands. Little interest had been shown towards the island state for some three decades (the embassy had been closed in 1993). But then came Beijing doing, at least from Washington’s perspective, the unpardonable thing of poking around and seeking influence.
Now, Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare finds himself at the centre of much interest, at least till he falls out of favour in the airconditioned corridors of Washington………………………………………………………………………………………….. https://theaimn.com/imperial-visits-us-emissaries-in-the-pacific/
1 This month
of the week – Disrupting War & Militarism in Oceania. Active solidarity. Radical practice.
Antinuclear 