Chris Hedges: the corporate state, the CIA, and the lynching of Julian Assange
Chris Hedges: The Puppets and the Puppet Masters
The judicial proceedings against Julian Assange give a faux legality to the state persecution of the most important and courageous journalist of our generation.
This is the talk given by Chris Hedges outside the Department of Justice in Washington, D.C. on Saturday October 8 at a rally that called on the U.S. to revoke its extradition request for Julian Assange.
https://scheerpost.com/2022/10/09/chris-hedges-the-puppets-and-the-puppet-masters/ By Chris Hedges / Original to ScheerPost, 9 Oct 22,
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Merrick Garland and those who work in the Department of Justice are the puppets, not the puppet masters. They are the façade, the fiction, that the longstanding persecution of Julian Assange has something to do with justice. Like the High Court in London, they carry out an elaborate judicial pantomime. They debate arcane legal nuances to distract from the Dickensian farce where a man who has not committed a crime, who is not a U.S. citizen, can be extradited under the Espionage Act and sentenced to life in prison for the most courageous and consequential journalism of our generation.
The engine driving the lynching of Julian is not here on Pennsylvania Avenue. It is in Langley, Virginia, located at a complex we will never be allowed to surround – the Central Intelligence Agency. It is driven by a secretive inner state, one where we do not count in the mad pursuit of empire and ruthless exploitation. Because the machine of this modern leviathan was exposed by Julian and WikiLeaks, the machine demands revenge.
The United States has undergone a corporate coup d’etat in slow motion. It is no longer a functioning democracy. The real centers of power, in the corporate, military and national security sectors, were humiliated and embarrassed by WikiLeaks. Their war crimes, lies, conspiracies to crush the democratic aspirations of the vulnerable and the poor, and rampant corruption, here and around the globe, were laid bare in troves of leaked documents.
We cannot fight on behalf of Julian unless we are clear about whom we are fighting against. It is far worse than a corrupt judiciary. The global billionaire class, who have orchestrated a social inequality rivaled by pharaonic Egypt, has internally seized all of the levers of power and made us the most spied upon, monitored, watched and photographed population in human history. When the government watches you 24-hours a day, you cannot use the word liberty. This is the relationship between a master and a slave. Julian was long a target, of course, but when WikiLeaks published the documents known as Vault 7, which exposed the hacking tools the CIA uses to monitor our phones, televisions and even cars, he — and journalism itself — was condemned to crucifixion. The object is to shut down any investigations into the inner workings of power that might hold the ruling class accountable for its crimes, eradicate public opinion and replace it with the cant fed to the mob.
I spent two decades as a foreign correspondent on the outer reaches of empire in Latin America, Africa, the Middle East and the Balkans. I am acutely aware of the savagery of empire, how the brutal tools of repression are first tested on those Frantz Fanon called “the wretched of the earth.” Wholesale surveillance. Torture. Coups. Black sites. Black propaganda. Militarized police. Militarized drones. Assassinations. Wars. Once perfected on people of color overseas, these tools migrate back to the homeland. By hollowing out our country from the inside through deindustrialization, austerity, deregulation, wage stagnation, the abolition of unions, massive expenditures on war and intelligence, a refusal to address the climate emergency and a virtual tax boycott for the richest individuals and corporations, these predators intend to keep us in bondage, victims of a corporate neo-feudalism. And they have perfected their instruments of Orwellian control. The tyranny imposed on others is imposed on us.
From its inception, the CIA carried out assassinations, coups, torture, and illegal spying and abuse, including that of U.S. citizens, activities exposed in 1975 by the Church Committee hearings in the Senate and the Pike Committee hearings in the House. All these crimes, especially after the attacks of 9/11, have returned with a vengeance. The CIA is a rogue and unaccountable paramilitary organization with its own armed units and drone program, death squads and a vast archipelago of global black sites where kidnapped victims are tortured and disappeared.
The U.S. allocates a secret black budget of about $50 billion a year to hide multiple types of clandestine projects carried out by the National Security Agency, the CIA and other intelligence agencies, usually beyond the scrutiny of Congress. The CIA has a well-oiled apparatus to kidnap, torture and assassinate targets around the globe, which is why, since it had already set up a system of 24-hour video surveillance of Julian in the Ecuadorean Embassy in London, it quite naturally discussed kidnapping and assassinating him. That is its business. Senator Frank Church — after examining the heavily redacted CIA documents released to his committee — defined the CIA’s “covert activity” as “a semantic disguise for murder, coercion, blackmail, bribery, the spreading of lies and consorting with known torturers and international terrorists.”
All despotisms mask state persecution with sham court proceedings. The show trials and troikas in Stalin’s Soviet Union. The raving Nazi judges in fascist Germany. The Denunciation rallies in Mao’s China. State crime is cloaked in a faux legality, a judicial farce.
If Julian is extradited and sentenced and, given the Lubyanka-like proclivities of the Eastern District of Virginia, this is a near certainty, it means that those of us who have published classified material, as I did when I worked for The New York Times, will become criminals. It means that an iron curtain will be pulled down to mask abuses of power. It means that the state, which, through Special Administrative Measures, or SAMs, anti-terrorism laws and the Espionage Act that have created our homegrown version of Stalin’s Article 58, can imprison anyone anywhere in the world who dares commit the crime of telling the truth.
We are here to fight for Julian. But we are also here to fight against powerful subterranean forces that, in demanding Julian’s extradition and life imprisonment, have declared war on journalism.
We are here to fight for Julian. But we are also here to fight for the restoration of the rule of law and democracy.
We are here to fight for Julian. But we are also here to dismantle the wholesale Stasi-like state surveillance erected across the West.
We are here to fight for Julian. But we are also here to overthrow — and let me repeat that word for the benefit of those in the FBI and Homeland Security who have come here to monitor us — overthrow the corporate state and create a government of the people, by the people and for the people, that will cherish, rather than persecute, the best among us.
You can see my interview with Julian’s father, John Shipton, here.
NOTE TO SCHEERPOST READERS FROM CHRIS HEDGES: There is now no way left for me to continue to write a weekly column for ScheerPost and produce my weekly television show without your help. The walls are closing in, with startling rapidity, on independent journalism, with the elites, including the Democratic Party elites, clamoring for more and more censorship. Bob Scheer, who runs ScheerPost on a shoestring budget, and I will not waver in our commitment to independent and honest journalism, and we will never put ScheerPost behind a paywall, charge a subscription for it, sell your data or accept advertising. Please, if you can, sign up at chrishedges.substack.com so I can continue to post my now weekly Monday column on ScheerPost and produce my weekly television show, The Chris Hedges Report.
Energy Resources of Australia’s investor Willy Packer completely wrong on Jabiluka uranium
https://gac-v3.katalyst.com.au/news_items/era-minorities-completely-wrong-on-jabiluka— Kirsten Blair, 10 Oct 122, The Mirarr Traditional Owners of the Ranger Uranium Mine totally reject the commentary of Energy Resources of Australia minor investor Willy Packer as completely wrong. Like ERA’s former Independent Board Committee, Mr Packer mistakenly considers the question of Jabiluka’s development as simply being about Traditional Owner consent.
Representing the Mirarr, the Gundjeihmi Aboriginal Corporation (GAC) seeks to bring clarity to the debate, including correcting misunderstandings about the contemporary significance of cultural heritage, insurmountable environmental and technical challenges at the site and the true costs of mining in the Kakadu region.
“It is simply wrong to say that anyone can just change their mind about Jabiluka in the future. This place is unique, Kakadu is World Heritage listed because of its value to the whole world. This isn’t about Traditional Owners agreeing to mining, they are defending heritage that matters to all of us. It is also wrong to ignore the fact that mining at Ranger produced a two-billion dollar clean-up bill. This is not just something interesting for valuers to toss around. What Packer wants is offensive to the majority of Australians,” CEO of Gundjeihmi Aboriginal Corporation Justin O’Brien said.
“It’s also wrong to ignore the scale of the rehabilitation. The task is massive. ERA must rehabilitate Ranger to a standard such that it may be incorporated into the surrounding national park. The company is obliged, among other requirements, to physically separate tailings from the environment for 10,000 years.
“Further mining in Kakadu National Park would be insane,” Mr O’Brien said.
Mr Packer has raised the prospect of the compensation of ERA’s minority shareholders. “Mr Packer is asking to be compensated for his wager on an impossible project. It’s nonsensical and contrary to standard business risk. This is why investors shouldn’t and don’t run mining companies.
“We are living in the 21st century; iconic cultural heritage of international significance is not up for negotiation. Our hearts go out to the Traditional Owners at Juukan Gorge. Their loss has focused the nation and indeed the international investment community on supporting Traditional Owners and protecting cultural heritage. Everyone wants to ensure Kakadu National Park is protected.
“Mr Packer needs to stop blaming Rio Tinto for his own ignorance about cultural heritage. Of course, Rio Tinto, now knows better after Juukan Gorge.”
Mr O’Brien said the role of directors within ERA is to be perfectly honest with the market, including all minor investors. “Unlike many other proposed projects on Aboriginal land, Jabiluka is utterly impossible – it is unfeasible both culturally and technically. Rio Tinto has acknowledged this. It is hardly a secret.
“Mr Packer has complained of something having gone “terribly wrong” with his gamble at Jabiluka. In fact, the only thing ‘terribly wrong’ has been the false hope of ignorant investors.”
Rotting in jail’: Thousands march for Julian Assange’s release as his brother urges Anthony Albanese to act.
Supporters of jailed WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange have formed a human chain in Melbourne’s city centre to protest his detention.
Thousands have marched through Melbourne’s city centre calling for the release of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
The 51-year-old Australian has been in London’s Belmarsh prison since he was removed from the Ecuadorian embassy in 2019.
Mr Assange is fighting a long-running legal battle to avoid extradition to the United States,
Melbourne protesters marched through the city streets and formed a human chain across a Southbank bridge on Saturday morning as they called on the Australian government to intervene.
“There’s an expectation in the electorate that the prime minister and this government is going to get Julian out of jail,” Mr Assange’s brother Gabriel Shipton told AAP.
“The prime minister’s statements before the election – enough is enough, he doesn’t see what purpose is served by Julian being kept in prison – those were seen as a commitment.
“It’s been so many days of this government and Julian is still rotting in that prison.”
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese should contact the United States president directly and plead Mr Assange’s case, Mr Shipton said.
“They can pick up the phone, call Joe Biden and say, hasn’t Julian suffered enough? Drop the charges and extradition,” he said.
“Julian would walk free.”
What’s the latest on Julian Assange’s case?
In June, then-United Kingdom home secretary Priti Patel approved Mr Assange’s extradition to the US
.Then, in August, lawyers for Mr Assange filed an appeal , arguing he is being prosecuted and punished for his political opinions.
Mr Assange was charged by the US with 17 counts of espionage and one charge of computer misuse after WikiLeaks published thousands of leaked military and diplomatic documents.
Melbourne’s demonstration against Mr Assange’s detention was one of many being held across the world on Saturday.
It was heartening to see such global solidarity for Mr Assange’s cause, Mr Shipton said.
“The movement is growing around the world as evidenced by these protests,” he said.
“We’re not going to stop. We are not going to be quiet.”
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Nuclear Power: the Right’s giant red herring
https://johnmenadue.com/nuclear-power-the-rights-giant-red-herring/?fbclid=IwAR2QLkHEc5nz2. By Ralph Evans, Oct 5, 2022
Politicians of the Right keep suggesting Australia should build nuclear power stations. Why? They are slow to build, very expensive and potentially risky, and we have far better alternatives. Their aim is to divide and to wedge. We should treat it as a giant red herring.
Why do politicians on the Right keep bringing up nuclear power?
Eric Abetz used to do it at every opportunity, before he lost his senate seat and (bizarrely) reappeared as head of the Monarchist movement.
Early this month Peter Dutton said in a speech to the Minerals Council that Australia needs “a frank debate” about nuclear power and that it presents “a wonderful opportunity to add value” to our uranium resources.
Many readers will have seen an interview by David Speers with a barely coherent Barnaby Joyce on Insiders. Twice, with no prompting, Joyce brought up the idea of small modular nuclear reactors. Speers commented wryly that these are not something people are talking about at the checkout in IGA.
The latest pro-nuclear voice is Matt Canavan, the Queensland senator who loves to dress up as a coal miner, replete with face covered in coal dust. Canavan announced in a tweet this week that he would join a group of senators proposing repeal of the current law banning nuclear power in Australia. He said “It is time to join the rest of the world and treat nuclear energy as a safe and effective option”.
This is just nonsense, babble. Nuclear power is a non-starter in Australia today. Nobody is champing at the bit to invest billions in nuclear, as they are in solar, wind, storage and hydrogen. So why is the Right carrying on about it?
We were bound to hear more of this when CPAC met in Sydney last weekend. CPAC is a conclave of deplorables, an American franchise.
Even if its economics were better, nuclear power would take far too long to build to contribute to our urgent need to reduce emissions. There is no way we could see nuclear power on-line here before the later 2030s, at the earliest. First, Parliaments (state and federal) would have to repeal the ban. Then governments would have to set up a strong regulatory regime, which is not a simple thing. Next, in the unlikely event that somebody were to step forward to propose a plant, there would be a long process of argument about sites and environmental approval. Who wants one of these in their neighbourhood? Last, construction and testing could easily take a decade or more, based on American and European examples.
Barnaby’s small modular reactors are an intriguing idea, but they don’t exist yet. The first, being built by US start-up Nuscale Power, is due to be complete in 2028 or 2029. It will take years after that to establish whether these smaller reactors have the lower costs and faster construction their proponents hope for.
CSIRO and the Australian Energy Market Operator published their 2021-22 edition of their annual Gencost report in July. They concluded (once again) that an integrated mix of solar and wind power and storage offers the lowest-cost new-build means of supplying the Australian market with electricity. The report saw no prospect of small modular nuclear reactors operating here in this decade. It said their cost could possibly come down in the future, but this would depend on successful deployment overseas.
Stories abound of delays and cost overruns with nuclear power. Britain’s Hinkley Point C station was first estimated to cost £4 billion. It is now over a decade late and expected to come in at £22-3 billion. Do we seriously want to get into this, when a renewable network can be built far more quickly and in smaller pieces?
The safety record of nuclear power is generally good. But when accidents occur they can be very big indeed. Naturally, they can prompt widespread community opposition. The Chernobyl disaster in Ukraine led to strong opposition to nuclear power in Germany and a plan to exit nuclear power. Fukushima led the government of Japan to mothball many existing nuclear stations. The total cost of the Fukushima clean-up may be as high as US$1 trillion. We have no need to take this kind of risk in Australia.
So why do the politicians of the Right keep talking up nuclear power? No doubt, some want to attract attention to themselves or to ingratiate themselves with interest groups like the Minerals Council. In addition, I suspect, they aim to sow confusion and to drive wedges into the community.
Nuclear power is a great subject for an old bore to bang on about in a pub or at a barbecue. It is easily linked to other hardy perennials, like the Bradfield Plan to pump water from coastal Queensland rivers like the Burdekin over the Great Divide to irrigate the inland. This has been demonstrated time and again to be uneconomic, but its advocates go on about it like a dog with a bone.
Nuclear power for Australia is nothing more than a giant red herring and should be treated as such.
Radiation ‘hotspots’: legacy of British nuclear tests lingers on idyllic islands in Western Australia
Tourists warned not spend more than an hour at the Montebello Islands sites – as a new study examines the effect of radioactive sands on marine life.
Guardian, Narelle Towie, @narelletowie 8 Oct 22,
The white ocean sands of Western Australia’s Montebello Islands may appear inviting, but 70 years ago they were the site of Britain’s first nuclear tests.
Now researchers are working to uncover how much and what type of radioactive material persists in sediment on the ocean floor of the archipelago, made up of 265 low-lying islands and islets, 1,200km north of Perth. They hope to get a clearer idea of its effects on the area’s abundant marine life and any lingering dangers to people who visit the islands for tourism or fishing.
The nuclear fallout from atomic blasts in the 1950s have been well studied on land, but little is known about how radioactive sands affect the 60,000-hectare marine park’s ecosystem.
In June 2020 a team led by Madison Hoffman, an environmental radioecologist at Edith Cowan University, collected hundreds of kilograms of sediment from an area near the blast sites, 120km west of Dampier, for analysis.
Hoffman says they detected levels of radioactivity higher than background levels, as expected.
“Those levels are highest in areas around where those three detonations took place, but we also have some areas which have come up with levels a little higher than we expected for where we found them.”
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The 12 nuclear tests carried out between 1952 and 1957 – including three in the Montebellos – were part of a secretive deal between Britain and Australia that was championed by the then prime minister, Robert Menzies. Further “minor trials” were carried out in South Australia until 1963.
The first test, codenamed Operation Hurricane, took place on 4 October 1952 at a lagoon off Trimouille Island in the Montebellos.
A decommissioned warship, HMS Plym, was rigged up with a 7kg plutonium device, sending tonnes of seawater and mud 3,000 metres into the air and impregnating the ocean sand with radioactive isotopes.
On 16 May and 19 June 1956 two more bombs were set off from towers at Trimouille and Alpha islands as part of Operation Mosaic. The bombs were boosted with hydrogen and lithium and were the biggest ever detonated in Australia.
Hoffman says while some radionuclides, or radioactive atoms, are blasted inside sand grains, others attach to the surface of sediment and shift in rough weather, such as during cyclonic activity.
“When we know what radionuclides there are and what ratios they are in, they can act like a fingerprint, kind of like a forensics tool that is distinct to the Montebellos,” Hoffman says.
“When sediment rock gets moved from point A to point B, it is taking those radionuclides with it and potentially moving those hotspots and migrating them around.”
Hoffman wants to know where these hotspots are so she can study how the radiation exposure affects sediment-dwelling marine life. The area is home to a rich variety of marine species including dugongs, turtles, whales, hundreds of fish species and mangroves………………….
Darren Koppel, a marine contaminant expert with the Australian Institute of Marine Science, says low levels of radiation over long periods can cause chronic toxicity to plants and other organisms.
“We do not have much data on the chronic effects of radiation to marine organisms, so this type of research is critical to fill those data gaps,” Koppel says.
“The most likely effect is that sensitive organisms and plants will have stopped living or growing in the areas with higher radioactivity, leaving only the more tolerant species.”
The Montebello Islands are managed by the WA Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions.
It says there are still “slightly elevated radiation levels” at Trimouille and Alpha islands and warns tourists not to camp or spend longer than one hour at those sites.
Tourists travel from the nearby towns of Karratha, Port Hedland, Onslow and Dampier on fishing trips. Despite warning signs , the department has found evidence of campers on the islands in recent years.
In the Great Victoria Desert, in outback South Australia, authorities spent millions trying to clean up radioactive fallout from nuclear testing at Maralinga, where the British detonated seven atomic bombs.
According to researchers at Monash University, residual plutonium and uranium still contaminate the land at Maralinga as tiny radioactive grains in the soil.
Little heed was given to the Anangu Pitjantjatjara people who lived on the land, who lived with the legacy of the explosions for decades afterwards. It wasn’t until 1994 that the Australian government paid $13.5m in compensation for what had been done to the land.
British and Australian servicemen exposed to radiation by the blasts have also fought long campaigns for the effects on their health to be recognised and adequately compensated…………………
Hoffman says that key technical documents about the nuclear testing, which could help with her research, were reclassified by the UK in 2018.
“We have so little documentation or information about what really happened,” Hoffman said.
“Without that information and all the really crucial statistics [about the blasts] it is really difficult to make sense of the answers we have now in relation to what originally happened.” https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/oct/08/radiation-hotspots-legacy-of-british-nuclear-tests-lingers-on-idyllic-islands-in-western-australia
Marshall Islands to receive U.N. support over nuclear legacy
https://english.kyodonews.net/news/2022/10/e2a640256da0-marshall-islands-to-receive-un-support-over-nuclear-legacy.html KYODO NEWS -8 Oct 22,
The U.N. Human Rights Council adopted a resolution Friday aimed at assisting the Marshall Islands in its efforts to secure justice for people suffering from the impact of the United States’ former nuclear testing program in its territory.
“We have suffered the cancer of the nuclear legacy for far too long and we need to find a way forward to a better future for our people,” Samuel Lanwi, deputy permanent representative of the Republic of the Marshall Islands in Geneva told the body in an emotional speech.
The United States conducted dozens of nuclear weapons tests in the islands of the Pacific state in the 1940s and ’50s, including the 1954 Castle Bravo test at Bikini Atoll, the biggest U.S. bomb ever detonated.
The text tabled by five Pacific Island states — the Marshall Islands, Fiji, Nauru, Samoa and Vanuatu — was backed by Australia and did not demand reparations.
It called on the U.N. rights chief to submit a report in September 2024 on the challenges to the enjoyment of human rights by the Marshallese people stemming from the nuclear legacy.
The United States as well as other nuclear weapons states such as Britain, India and Pakistan expressed concern about some aspects of the text but did not ask for a vote on the motion. Japan did not speak at the meeting.
The Marshallese people are still struggling with the health and environmental consequences of the nuclear tests, including higher cancer rates. Many people displaced due to the tests are still unable to return home.
A concrete dome on Runit Island containing radioactive waste is of particular concern, especially in relation to rising sea levels as a result of climate change, according to the countries that drafted the resolution.
The Marshall Islands says a settlement reached in 1986 with the United States fell short of addressing the extensive environmental and health damage that resulted from the tests.
The U.S. government asserts the bilateral agreement settled “all claims, past, present and future,” including nuclear compensation.
Observers say some nuclear states fear the initiative for the Marshall Islands could open the door to other countries bringing similar issues to the rights body.
What do you think the arms trade is, a charity? Actually yes, that’s what it is
Michael West Media, by Callum Foote | Oct 7, 2022,
All’s not fair at the warfare Expo, where taxpayer-funded arms merchants hobnob with military types by invitation only. “Aggressive” journalists not allowed. Persona non grata Callum Foote reports on Land Forces 2022, Australia’s biggest War Fair.
Land Forces is the annual exposition for the defence industry, or the most profitable corporate welfare exercise in the country.
Australia is the fourth largest importer of weapons in the world, behind Saudi Arabia, India and Egypt. It is roughly the 20th largest exporter of weapons. This is a disparity former Defence Minister Christopher Pyne, now a defence industry consultant, set out to rectify in 2018 with the launch of the $3 billion Defence Export Strategy after meeting with Abu Dhabi’s Crown Prince Mohamed bin Zayed al Nahyan. Pyne, who was in attendance at Land Forces 2022, stated at the time the goal of making Australia a top-10 exporter.
Over the next decade, the Australian government will invest $200 billion in the Defence Force with an eye to support the weapons export industry. In line with these goals, Australian military spending has shot through the roof – from $10 billion in 2000 to just under $50 billion in the last budget. The big winners? Largely foreign multinational defence contractors, and plenty of small local ones too; they’re growing along with the public spending.
Land Forces is their gathering, the gathering of the year for those looking to earn a profit from this public investment. The conference brings in interest from international weapons makers such as Boeing and Thales as well as 700-odd smaller Australian manufacturers and service providers hoping to get in on the action.
Alms for arms
The company behind Land Forces, AMDA, formerly the Aerospace Maritime and Defence Foundation of Australia, is part of a group of companies registered with Australian Charities and Non-for-profit Commission which operates around the country.
Yes, that’s right: AMDA is a weapons charity; and despite its income of $10m-plus from defence contractors and governments, it also helped itself to JobKeeper subsidies, despite rising profits during the Pandemic.
t has 24 full-time-equivalent employees and had a total revenue in 2021 of $8.5 million – 13% of which came from government grants.
While revenue in 2021 was down from 2020, where the ‘‘charity’’ pulled in $10.5 million, profit was actually up from $2.1 to $3.5 million. Sales revenue also rose slightly in 2021 from $7.2 million to $7.4 million.
Where this charity’s financials differ from most, not even to begin discussing its purpose, is that as of 2021 AMDA has $32.5 million in assets, up from $28 million the year before, with over $10 million of that being in cash or cash equivalents. Were it not for JobKeeper, its large cash reserves would still be large but not quite so large.
With all this cash, one would think that AMDA could weather any storm. Not so, according to the board which includes not one but two former chiefs of the Australian Navy, a former chief of Army and Air Force and a former CEO of Lockheed Martin Australia, who decided to take JobKeeper payments.
That’s right, over 2020 and 2021 AMDA took $1.2 million in JobKeeper payments, $870,000 in 2021 and $360,000 in 2020.
In the same period the total remuneration to the key management personnel of the charity, people such as the CEO and the board members, was $1.5 million and $1.4 million respectively.
Despite the fact that this is public money, AMDA has refused to comment on whether it will be returning the taxpayer subsidies it took to line the coffers of its charity while increasing executive pay.
Embedded with the activists
The activists protesting outside the arms fair are up against a powerful foe, and they know it.
While protesting under the banner of Disrupt Land Forces, a campaign organised under the flag of activist organisation Wage Peace, the activists are reluctant to claim that they are a part of any organisation at all. It’s more of a community, they say.
Most protesters are wary of the media and wish to remain anonymous. There are members of more ‘‘hardcore’’ organisations such as Extinction Rebellion and Blockade Australia, 12 of which were arrested last June during civil action related to climate change.
On Tuesday morning, around 50 or so of the protesters gathered outside the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre entrance where a rally received moderate media attention from SBS and Channels 10 and Seven.
These media outlets were really only interested in the Greens politicians, led by Senator David Shoebridge, who briefly talked to the activists before clearing off. The cameras then left with them, leaving the activists to the rest of the weeks activities.
Depending on who you ask, the goal of the protesters is to either meaningfully decrease the attendance of the conference or increase the cost of putting it on……………………………………………………..
A likely Coalition
Many of the protesters have been involved in activism for decades, such as Margie Pestorius, a spokesperson for Wage Peace who has been protesting since the late 1980s.
“I was part of the Melbourne Rainforest Action Group [MRAG] at its height in 1989. We blockaded ships carrying Malaysian rainforest timber threatening the livelihoods and lives of the Indigenous Penan and the ecosystems they had nurtured and lived with.”
Pestorius has since pivoted to anti-militarism activism, which lacks the same support as environmental causes here in Australia.
Among the protesters are Aunty Sue Haseldine, Indigenous elder from Kokatha country who has had to deal with the fallout of atomic weapons testing in her country. Now she has learnt that Souther Launch, an Australian space company who has “aligning their business goals with defence industry priorities” according to Thales will be testing on her land once again.
Aunty Sue says she will refuse to leave if testing goes ahead “If they’re going to destroy heritage then they’re going to destroy me too. That country out there is our church, our school, our spirituality, our pharmacy. It is shameful to know that these weapons will be tested on our country which will then be used to commit atrocities across the world” she told a crowd outside Thales’ office in Brisbane.
Uncle George Dimara from West Papua also spoke outside Thales, decrying the use of Australian-built Thales Bushmasters being used by Indonesian forces in West Papua.
Others include members from Teachers for Peace, a group of Australian teachers who are pushing back against what they see as the encroachment of defence industry spending in the education sector.
The protests lack the wide-scale support seen in the environmental movement such as the thousands strong marches that have taken place in Australia’s major cities over the past few years, but that doesn’t mean these activists are dismayed.
According to Adrian Heaney, a spokesperson for Wage Peace, “these protests have demonstrated our commitment to resisting the profit-fuelled arms race enabled by institutions like Land Forces. Arms fairs of this kind in Australia have been stopped before by people power—it’s our responsibility to continue this tradition. There is no time left for more murder, more destruction. We need collaboration, not more conflict.” https://michaelwest.com.au/what-do-you-think-the-arms-trade-is-a-charity-actually-yes-thats-what-it-is/
Never mind Australia’s economic problems, health crisis etc – Weapons for Zelensky is the big need.
Zelensky: Australia to deliver ‘significant’ new support for Ukraine, The Age Matthew Knott, October 6, 2022 Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has revealed Australia is preparing to ramp up support for his nation’s war against Russia by announcing a new tranche of military assistance, including donations of heavy weapons.
In an appearance via video link at the Lowy Institute think tank in Sydney, Zelensky urged the global community not to give in to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s “nuclear blackmail”………………..
Asked what Australia could do to help Ukraine, Zelensky said the Albanese government had been preparing a “significant package” of assistance that will be announced soon.
“This process is ongoing as we speak and I’m very grateful to that,” he said. “It’s not only small arms but heavy weapons as well.”
Zelensky said that, for the upcoming round of assistance, Australia had been negotiating with other countries to announce a joint support package for Ukraine.
Ukrainian Ambassador to Australia Vasyl Myroshnychenko has publicly asked Australia to provide Ukraine with a supply of anti-ship missiles known as Harpoons and howitzer long-range weapons.
Ukraine is also asking for an additional fleet of 30 four-wheel drive vehicles on top of the 60 already provided…………………..
He also called for “new and tough sanctions against Russia” as a punishment for its invasion of Ukraine. https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/zelensky-australia-to-deliver-significant-new-support-for-ukraine-20221006-p5bnrm.html
Coalition nuclear power bill “dead on arrival,” but somehow the debate lives on.
Australia’s atomic culture warriors are now focused on promoting ‘advanced’ nuclear power and small modular reactors. A new report debunks – yet again – the propaganda. The post Coalition nuclear power bill “dead on arrival,” but somehow the debate lives on appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Coalition nuclear power bill “dead on arrival,” but somehow the debate lives on — RenewEconomy
RenewEconomy, Dr. Jim Green 5 October 2022, Australia’s nuclear power debate refuses to die. The phenomenon was neatly summarised by Bernard Keane in Crikey in August:
“Nuclear power has to be the single most boring and ossified ritual in Australian public policy. Someone on the right will call for a “debate” on nuclear power. Critics will point out that nuclear power is ludicrously expensive, takes decades to build, and is prone to multi-hundred per cent cost blowouts.
“The right will then invoke, reflexively, small modular reactors, which aren’t operating anywhere in the world despite having been promised for 30 years. Someone else will then ask which electorate the proponents propose to put a reactor in. Rinse, repeat.”
As repetitive as the debate has become, there are interesting contributions from time to time.
Dr Ziggy Switkowski led the Howard government’s nuclear review in 2006 and was arguably Australia’s most prominent champion of nuclear power.
But, to his credit, Switkowski has been following the dramatic cost reductions of renewables and the equally dramatic cost escalations of nuclear power. In 2019, Dr. Switkowski dropped an atomic bombshell, stating that “the window for gigawatt-scale nuclear has closed” with renewables winning on economic grounds.
Former NSW Premier Bob Carr is another former supporter who has been swayed by the facts. Carr noted in The Australian last November that “nuclear is lumbering, subject to breakdowns and cripplingly expensive” and that “the contrast with the surge to renewables is stark.”
Conservative commentator Paul Kelly poured cold water on the Coalition’s nuclear crusaders in The Australian last November.
Kelly’s column pointed to the “popular pull of renewables” and their falling costs. He noted that “nuclear plant construction remains poor in advanced OECD nations, the main reason being not safety but its weak business case”.
Kelly also questioned the rhetoric around small modular reactors given that “none has so far been built in developed nations”.
On the politics, Kelly wrote that
“The populist conservatives have form. Before the 2019 poll, they campaigned on the mad idea that Morrison follow Donald Trump and quit the Paris Agreement. Now they campaign on the equally mad but more dangerous idea that he seek to split the country by running on nuclear power… As for those conservatives who say Morrison’s job is to fight Labor, the answer is simple. His job is to beat Labor. That’s hard enough now; vesting the Coalition with an unnecessary ideological crusade that will crash and burn only means he would have no chance.“
Some Coalition MPs seem incapable of understanding the politics. On September 28, nine ultra-conservative Coalition Senators introduced a private members bill to Parliament calling for the repeal of Howard-era legislation banning nuclear power.
But the Liberal and National senators don’t even have the support of their own parties, so their private members bill was dead on arrival.
Matt Canavan was among the group of nine Senators. He claims to oppose policies that will drive up power prices but supports nuclear power even though he has himself noted that it would increase power bills.
Perhaps he should read Paul Kelly’s column in The Australian. And he should read the work of CSIRO and the Australian Energy Market Operator which dispels any notion that nuclear power is economically viable in Australia.
“Advanced” nuclear power
A 2019 federal parliamentary Environment and Energy Committee inquiry was controlled by Coalition MPs who were, in principle, exceedingly enthusiastic about nuclear power.
However the Committee’s report argued that the government should retain legal bans prohibiting the development of conventional, large nuclear power reactors. Committee chair Ted O’Brien said “Australia should say a definite ‘no’ to old nuclear technologies”.
The Committee’s report called for a partial repeal of legal bans to permit the development of “new and emerging nuclear technologies” including small modular reactors, but that was quickly ruled out by the Morrison government.
Nonetheless, propaganda about ‘advanced’ nuclear power persists and the Australian Conservation Foundation has released a new briefing paper debunking that propaganda……………………………………………….
Australia’s energy future is renewable, not radioactive
The pursuit of SMRs or ‘advanced’ nuclear power in Australia would be expensive and protracted. The South Australian Nuclear Fuel Cycle Royal Commission stated in its 2016 report:
“Advanced fast reactors and other innovative reactor designs are unlikely to be feasible or viable in the foreseeable future. The development of such a first-of-a-kind project in South Australia would have high commercial and technical risk. Although prototype and demonstration reactors are operating, there is no licensed, commercially proven design. Development to that point would require substantial capital investment.”
The federal Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources expects 69 percent renewable supply to the National Electricity Market by 2030. The Albanese Government’s target is 82 percent renewable supply to the National Electricity Market by 2030.
State and territory governments (including Liberal/Coalition governments) are focused on the renewables transition. Tasmania leads the pack thanks to its hydro resources. South Australia is another pace-setter: wind and solar supply 64 percent of local power generation and SA could reach its target of net 100 percent renewables within a few years.
The pursuit of nuclear power would slow the transition to a low-carbon economy. It would increase electricity costs. It would unnecessarily introduce challenges and risks associated with high-level nuclear waste management and the potential for catastrophic accidents.
The pursuit of nuclear power in Australia makes no sense whatsoever. Australia’s energy future is renewable, not radioactive. https://reneweconomy.com.au/coalition-nuclear-power-bill-dead-on-arrival-but-somehow-the-debate-lives-on/—
Dr. Jim Green is the national nuclear campaigner with Friends of the Earth Australia and co-author of the ACF’s briefing paper, ‘Wrong reaction: Why ‘next-generation’ nuclear is not a credible energy solution’.
The Australian Radioactive Waste Agency (ARWA) shows that the planned Kimba dump is predominantly for ANSTO’s wastes , NOT for medical wastes.
see new 2-page Briefer “ARWA’s National Inventory of Radioactive Waste shows the Kimba dump is predominantly for ANSTO’s waste” https://nuclear.foe.org.au/…/Inventory-ARWA-Noonan…
Extracts:
ANSTO – Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation – is the predominant source of existing and future radioactive waste to be disposed and stored at Kimba.
ARWA report a five-fold increase in Low Level Waste (LLW) to be disposed at Kimba, with the existing 2 490 m3 LLW intended to increase to a total of 13 287 m3 LLW over the next 100-year period all to be dumped near Kimba.
ARWA states: “The estimated volumes of ANSTO’s future Low Level Waste and Intermediate Level Waste are substantially greater than previously reported.”
ANSTO has produced over 92% of Australia’s existing total LLW Inventory.
ANSTO intend to produce over 98% of future LLW in Australia over the next 100 years.
ANSTO are responsible for over 99.5% of the radioactivity in Australia’s total LLW inventory to be dumped at Kimba.
ARWA reports only a total of 5 (five) m3 of LLW originates from non-ANSTO and non-Commonwealth agency sources
total Hospital existing and future LLW is reported at only 3 m3
total “Research and Education” sector existing and future LLW is reported at only 2 m3
Claims that a national LLW disposal facility is needed at Kimba for hospital and medical waste are false.
ANSTO are near solely responsible for plans to more than double Australia’s total Intermediate Level Wastes (ILW) inventory
ANSTO have produced and hold 96.5% of Australia’s existing ILW packaged inventory at Lucas Heights
ANSTO propose to generate 97% of future ILW in Australia over the next 50-year period
ARWA reports Australia’s total inventory of ILW including nuclear materials, existing and future wastes over the next 50-year period, is 4 377 m3, these hazardous wastes are to be transported to Kimba for indefinite above ground storage.
Hospitals are stated to hold a total of only a single m3 of existing ILW with no future ILW arising.
Nuclear materials feature ANSTO’s nuclear fuel wastes – that were described as “highly hazardous” material by ARPANSA’s inaugural CEO John Loy in evidence to an NSW Parliamentary Inquiry.
Based on ARWA’s Report, all non-ANSTO sources produce on average only approx. 1.3 m3 per year of LLW over the next 100 years and produce approx. 1.34 m3 per year of ILW over the next 50 years.
‘Next generation’ nuclear is not a credible energy response – makes no sense for Australia- The Australian Conservation Foundation
The pressing need to transition from fossil fuel energy to a low carbon future has seen renewed calls for domestic nuclear power in Australia. The Australian Conservation Foundation has recently reviewed scientific literature and industry practice from Australia and around to world to see if any developments in nuclear technology might have changed the role of this deeply contested power source.
Our findings are captured in a new report, which provides a clear pathway to a low carbon energy system. ACF is committed to effective climate action but maintains that ‘next generation’ nuclear is not a credible energy response and the pursuit of nuclear power in Australia makes no sense.
It would slow the transition to a low-carbon economy, increase electricity costs and unnecessarily introduce challenges and risks associated with high-level nuclear waste management including the potential for catastrophic accidents, with profound inter-generational economic implications for Australian taxpayers.
It is important to note that proponents of nuclear power in Australia are not calling for the deployment
of existing nuclear reactor technology. Instead, they are promoting ‘next generation’ nuclear technology which currently does not exist to scale.
Australian Conservation Foundation 5th Oct 2022
https://www.acf.org.au/our-shared-energy-future-is-renewable-not-radioactive
Australia the ‘subimperial power’
ABC Radio National – Late Night Live – Broadcast 4 Oct 22, A new book ‘Subimperial Power – Australia in the International Arena’ argues Australians ought to be told what our relationship with the United States is really about: a relationship where we eagerly and routinely act to help the US keep its imperial position at the apex of global power. Iraq, Afghanistan and now AUKUS – the book argues Australians have been kept in the dark as to the real motivations behind these consequential decisions.
Philip Adams interviews Clinton Fernandez – https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/latenightlive/australia-the-subimperial-power-/101503728
Pacific islanders want nuclear legacy aid
https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/7931308/pacific-islanders-want-nuclear-legacy-aid/ By Emma Farge, October 5 2022,
Nuclear powers have criticised an effort led by the Marshall Islands and backed by Australia at the United Nations to seek help on dealing with the consequences of nuclear testing.
The issue is before the UN’s Human Rights Council and involves the United States, Britain, Russia, India and China, all of them nuclear-armed.
Pacific islanders, who are particularly threatened by rising sea levels from climate change, are becoming more vocal in seeking redress from former colonial powers and wealthy countries on environmental and climate issues which they say affect their human rights.
This motion brought to the Human Rights Council on Monday by the Marshall Islands, Fiji, Nauru, Samoa and Vanuatu and backed by Australia requests assistance from the UN rights office; seeks a report from its boss; and calls for a future debate at the council.
“The nuclear legacy is a lived reality for us that must be addressed,” Samuel Lanwi, deputy permanent representative of the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) in Geneva told Reuters.
The United States conducted 67 nuclear weapons tests in the Marshall Islands from 1946 to 1958 including “Castle Bravo” at Bikini Atoll in 1954 – the largest US bomb ever detonated. Islanders still suffer the health and environmental effects such as high cancer rates and enduring displacement from contaminated areas.
The Marshall Islands Ambassador to the UN in Geneva, Doreen de Brum could not join the talks because she is on leave following her daughter’s death from cancer. “My fight for nuclear justice is personal,” she said on Twitter.
While the motion does not mention the United States by name, some see it as an attempt to wield leverage over Washington in ongoing negotiations on a Compact of Free Association (COFA) that governs US economic assistance to the RMI. Marshallese diplomats deny this.
The nuclear legacy has been a major sticking point in the talks, although last week US President Joe Biden’s administration acknowledged it and said it remained committed to addressing concerns.
The Marshall Islands, one of 47 voting members on the rights council, is a key Western ally including on human rights, such as on scrutiny of China’s rights record.
Three sources who attended the Geneva talks told Reuters they were surprised by the level of resistance to a resolution seeking “technical assistance” – a term that could take the form of legal and political advice – rather than a formal probe.
“Nuclear powers were converging in their determination to protect themselves from any future accountability and there were attempts to empty out the resolution of any significance,” Yves Lador from Earthjustice said.
Diplomats say there were concerns about opening the door for future litigation. Past nuclear test sites include French Polynesia, Algeria, Kazakhstan and China’s Xinjiang.
The United States, Britain and India all argued that the rights council was not the appropriate forum to raise the issue and sought to strip out references to the new UN right to a clean and healthy environment, according to the sources.
China and Russia also argued for the latter, they said.
The British and Russian missions declined to comment. India’s did not respond. A spokesperson for China’s mission said they had “constructively participated” in the talks.
A vote might be called later this week – something that happens in a minority of cases when countries cannot agree.
‘Next-generation’ nuclear power a furphy
By Marion Rae, Canberra Times, October 5 2022 ,
Small-scale nuclear power for Australia’s remote mining sites and communities has been dismissed as toxic and too expensive.
Research released on Wednesday by the Australian Conservation Foundation found the nuclear option would increase power bills, risk catastrophic accidents and bring new challenges for dealing with waste………………..
The ACF report dismisses the new SMR technology as expensive and unviable, and found small reactors in Russia and China have been subject to serious delays and cost blowouts.
SMRs could not be introduced to Australia without huge taxpayer subsidies, and would result in higher electricity prices, the report said.
“While there are hopes and dreams of ramping up SMR production, the mass-manufacturing facilities needed to produce the technology are found nowhere in the world,” the report said.
Earlier this year, CSIRO estimated 2030 costs at up to $326 per megawatt hour for SMR-generated nuclear power compared to up to $82 for wind and solar in a grid powered 90 per cent by renewable electricity.
Federal energy agencies have also found the designs are at best “paper reactors” and billions of dollars away from being ready.
………………………………………… critics say mining, processing and transporting uranium is highly polluting, as is reactor construction and waste management over thousands of years. https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/7929821/next-generation-nuclear-power-a-furphy/
‘Unproven’ small nuclear reactors would raise Australia’s energy costs and delay renewable uptake, report says
Australian Conservation Foundation report finds modular reactors are expensive and introduce unnecessary challenges in managing radioactive waste
Guardian, Graham Readfearn 5 Oct 22,
The next generation of small nuclear reactors being advocated by the Coalition would raise electricity prices, slow the uptake of renewables and introduce new risks from nuclear waste, according to a report from the Australian Conservation Foundation.
But the report from the conservation group has found only two small modular reactors (SMRs) are known to be operating around the world, in Russia and China, and both have seen large cost blowouts.
Promoters of nuclear energy, the report claims, were pinning their hopes on technology that was “uncertain and unproven”.
“The good news about the renewed nuclear discussion is that it highlights that business as usual with fossil fuels is not an option,” the report found.
“The bad news is the very real risk of delay, distraction and a failure to advance a just energy transition”.
Last week during question time, the energy minister, Chris Bowen, mocked the Coalition for supporting nuclear and asked which MP would be willing to have a reactor in their electorate.
Nuclear energy has been effectively banned in Australia since the late 1990s, but some Coalition senators are pushing for those restrictions to be lifted.
The opposition leader, Peter Dutton, has tasked the shadow climate minister, Ted O’Brien, to review the status of nuclear energy.
In the report Dave Sweeney, ACF’s Nuclear Free campaigner, wrote SMRs would push up electricity costs and introduce unnecessary challenges in managing nuclear waste.
“In short, Australia’s energy future is renewable, not radioactive,” he wrote.
According to the report, Russia’s floating nuclear plant, the Akademik Lomonosov, has two small SMR units on board. Construction costs had ballooned sixfold.
Work started in 2012 on a demonstration plant in China with two gas-cooled reactors that was completed nine years later, costing $8.8bn.
“The global SMR reality simply does not come close to matching the Australian SMR rhetoric,” the report says.
Three further SMR plants were under construction in Argentina, China and Russia but had been plagued by cost rises and delays, the report said.
In June, a study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggested future deployment of SMRs could increase the amount of nuclear waste by factors of two to 30, depending on the design.
……………………………………….. In June the International Energy Agency said SMRs were not yet commercially viable, but “lower cost, smaller size and reduced project risks” could improve social acceptance.
There was increased support and interest in Canada, France, UK and the US for the technology, the report said, adding: “But the successful long-term deployment of SMRs hinges on strong support from policymakers starting now, not just to mobilise investment but also to streamline and harmonise regulatory frameworks.” https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/oct/05/unproven-small-nuclear-reactors-would-raise-energy-costs-and-delay-renewable-uptake-report-says
1 This month
7 April – WEBINAR – Australia and the Doomsday Clock – Preventing nuclear war through NoFirstUse and other policies
Online | Tuesday April 7, 4:00-5:30pm, Australian Eastern Time / 8:00-9:30am Central Europe Time
– Access the registration link
15 April – Zoom –Nuclear Power is Not the Solution
Apr 15, 2026 01:00 AM in Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney
Join the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) on Tuesday, April 14th for a timely webinar exploring the risks associated with nuclear power and challenging the myth that it offers a simple, safe, carbon-free solution to the climate crisis
21 April Webinar: No Nuclear Weapons in Australia
Start: 2026-04-21 18:00:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
End: 2026-04-21 19:30:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
Event Type: Virtual
A virtual link will be communicated before the event.
Host Contact Info: australia@icanw.org
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity
Antinuclear 