Nuclear-free New Zealand – sound law, sound policy
Nuclear-free has ‘served us well’ – Geoffrey Palmer, Radio New Zealand, 22 July 16 An architect of New Zealand’s once contentious anti-nuclear law says it remains the right approach for the country.
The law is in the spotlight as preparations begin for the first visit by an American warship since the landmark legislation was passed in 1987.
Under the law, the Prime Minister must make an assessment of whether the ship will breach New Zealand’s ban on nuclear weapons and nuclear power.
The US has not sent a naval ship since 1983, as it refuses to say whether its ships are nuclear-armed, as required by New Zealand’s nuclear-free law.
The deputy prime minister at the time the nuclear-free law was passed, Sir Geoffrey Palmer, told Morning Report the policy, and the law behind it, was sound…….http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/309192/nuclear-free-has-‘served-us-well’-geoffrey-palmer
Turnbull govt still backing Trans Pacific Partnership
Trans-Pacific Partnership: Trade Minister Steve Ciobo says he won’t give up on deal, Sydney Morning Herald, July 14 2016
The Turnbull government is refusing to give up on an ambitious 12-nation trade pact despite the prospect of a protectionist Senate and opposition in the US.
The Trans-Pacific Partnership: the dirtiest trade deal, you’ve never heard of
The upper house is shaping up to be difficult for the government’s free-trade agenda and its plans to ratify the Trans-Pacific Partnership. The Nick Xenophon Team, Pauline Hanson’s One Nation and Jacqui Lambie, considered either protectionist or anti-free trade, are readying to take their spots in the Senate.
Senator Xenophon said the government should throw in the towel on the TPP, which he believes will fail to deliver the promised benefits.
He fears the agreement will sacrifice tens of thousands of Australian jobs, accusing the government of failing to think through the real-life consequences.
But his most potent argument is that the deal could be dead in the water anyway given US presidential candidates Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton oppose it.
“Why are we jumping into this deal when whoever will be US president doesn’t want a bar of it?” Senator Xenophon told ABC radio on Thursday. However Trade Minister Steve Ciobo, who was in Washington this week to discuss the TPP, is not prepared to walk away.
But the minister was careful to pick up on the apparent rise of domestic scepticism on trade deals.
“I do appreciate that some Australians feel a little alienated by a globalised world, by a world in which currency flows, people flows, trade flows are happening at a faster rate than ever before,” Mr Ciobo told ABC TV.
“I don’t think you say it’s over till it’s over.”
He hopes the deal could at least be cleared at home with the help of the Labor Party. http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/transpacific-partnership-trade-minister-steve-ciobo-says-he-wont-give-up-on-deal-20160714-gq5ozu.html
Warning to Australia against being USA ‘deputy sheriff’ near China
Labor’s Bob Carr warns against ‘deputy sheriff’ military action in South China Sea, The Age, July 14 2016 Daniel Flitton Former Labor foreign minister Bob Carr has warned Australia risks looking like a US “deputy sheriff” should warships sail close to China’s artificial islands…….
“The plain fact is if Australia joined American patrols or ran patrols of its own that penetrated the 12-mile radius of Chinese-claimed territory, we would be the only American ally to do so,” Mr Carr told Fairfax Media.
China has denounced the ruling in the arbitration case brought by the Philippines as “null and void” and threatened to impose controls on aircraft over the disputed waters.
The territorial dispute has escalated in recent years after China seized control of coral atolls and tiny islands in waters claimed by the Philippines, dredging the sea floor to reclaim land and construct aircraft runways, which could serve as military bases.
Speaking from Beijing, Mr Carr said a diplomatic course was more likely to find a solution.
Asked about Senator Conroy’s comments, Mr Carr said Bill Shorten and shadow foreign affairs spokeswoman Tanya Plibersek had shown “realism” by supporting the diplomatic path.
“If our response to the arbitration were to immediately signal patrols that mimicked the American patrols, Australia would be one out among all American partners in the region. We’d look like the deputy sheriff,” he said…….http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/labors-bob-carr-warns-against-deputy-sheriff-military-action-in-south-china-sea-20160713-gq5arp.html
USA’s and Russia’s provocative nuclear ‘war games’
United States “playing nuclear chicken with Russia, http://www.b92.net/eng/news/world.php?yyyy=2016&mm=07&dd=12&nav_id=98588 “Helen Caldicott, the 1985 Nobel Peace Prize nominee, has warned about the danger related to the decisions made during a recent NATO summit. SOURCE: SPUTNIK TUESDAY, JULY 12, 2016 “The decisions reached at NATO are hardly believable considering current world politics and the state of play between Russia and the United States, both heavily armed nuclear nations… as they practice nuclear war exercises and ‘games’ adjacent to their respective borders,” she told Sputnik.
The two-day summit in Warsaw on Friday and Saturday approved the deployment of four battalions on Russian borders, made up of about 4,000 troops.
“Surely, the politicians and military personnel in Washington must realize that they are playing nuclear chicken with Russia,” said Caldicott, founding president of Physicians for Social Responsibility, and added:
“Large increases in NATO troops and equipment in countries once an integral part of the Soviet Union (and) anti-missile bases in Romania, Poland, Turkey and Spain, are extremely provocative to Russia which is clearly concerned for good reason.”
Sputnik noted in its report that Caldicott is the author of numerous books, including “The New Nuclear Danger: George W. Bush’s Military Industrial Complex,” and that the Smithsonian Institution named her “one of the most influential women of the 20th century.”
Australia joins the nuclear marketing push to India
Australia backs India to join nuclear supplier club, China hesitates http://www.smh.com.au/world/australia-backs-india-to-join-nuclear-supplier-club-china-hesitates-20160623-gpq1pq.html
June 23, 2016 Daniel Flitton Senior Correspondent Australia will formally back India to join the club of nuclear suppliers at a summit in Seoul on Friday, a move that will finally lay to rest a bitter stoush over selling uranium to the nuclear armed giant.
But China has signalled it could veto the bid because India has refused to sign the international treaty to stop the spread of atomic weapons.
The US is strongly backing India to join the 48-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group, seen as the last hurdle to allow international trade in nuclear materials to India.
The bid has been complicated by a late application from Pakistan to also join the group. India and Pakistan have each built atomic arsenals, but insist they only want access to nuclear materials to generate electricity. The potential sale of uranium to India has a long history and is seen as a test of great power rivalry in the region.
Australia fell out with India during the Kevin Rudd years after Labor junked a Howard-era deal to sell uranium to New Delhi on a promise the yellowcake would only be used for peaceful purposes. Mr Rudd insisted allowing India an exemption would weaken global rules, with an angry India insisting it had never spread nuclear technology.
A fierce debate later erupted within Labor after Julia Gillard decided to reverse Australia’s position and back the deal.
Labor’s national platform now calls for the export of uranium “only under the most stringent conditions” and to countries signed up to the non-proliferation treaty, which limits the number of nuclear armed nations and pledges to work toward disarmament.
But Labor has granted India an exception as “an important strategic partner for Australia” despite concern over an Abbott government deal that safeguards on uranium sales to India are too weak and parliamentary calls for additional controls.
Australian diplomats at the meeting in Seoul will “strongly support” India’s application but have yet to commit on Pakistan’s bid.
There is a wait-and-see approach to Pakistan on how it will control export of nuclear materials, given the record of the country’s former chief scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan in providing nuclear technology to Iran and North Korea.
Any country in the nuclear suppliers group effectively wields a veto as the organisation makes decisions only by consensus. China, one of five countries recognised as nuclear-armed nations under international law, has flagged its objection to allowing India into the group without signing the non-proliferation treaty.
But India has refused to sign on, given this would mean surrendering its nuclear weapons.
Greg Hunt’s gaffe over UNESCO and the Great Barrier Reef
How Greg Hunt and his department turned good news into an international scandal
The full draft of the Unesco report on climate change reveals many mentions of Australia were actually positive, Guardian, Michael Slezak, 31 May 2016 Greg Hunt has conducted one of the strangest manoeuvres of his already rather gymnastic career, over the erasure of Australia from a United Nations report on climate change.
Guardian Australia had broken the story that all mentions of Australia and the Great Barrier Reef had been scrubbed from the report at the request of the environment department.
Hunt first denied knowing about it but then justified the move with reasons that went beyond those provided by the department.
In fact the full draft report, obtained exclusively by Guardian Australia, reveals many of the mentions of Australia were positive – but their removal turned what would have been a relatively good news story into an international scandal. Continue reading
NASA scientist and European Space Agency dismayed at CSIRO climate research cuts
‘Dismay’: NASA scientist appeals to CSIRO not to cut global climate efforts, The Age, May 12, 2016 Peter Hannam Environment Editor, The Sydney Morning Herald
A top scientist from US space agency NASA has appealed to CSIRO to abandon plans to cut a key monitoring program that it says will undermine Australia and the world’s ability to monitor and predict climate change. Continue reading
Liberal coalition plans nuclear submarine fleet so that we can fight China
Coalition plans nuclear-powered submarine fleet over long term. Fin Rev, by Aaron Patrick and Phillip Coorey, 1 MAY 16
Some of Australia’s new submarines could be nuclear-powered by the time they enter service, making them much more potent against the huge Chinese navy.
One of the reasons French ship builder Direction des Constructions Navales Services, also known as DCNS, won the $50 billion contract was its ability to switch easily to a nuclear version of the submarines being designed for the Royal Australian Navy.
That is because the Australian diesel-powered Shortfin Barracuda will be a shorter, lighter version of a nuclear submarine already being manufactured by DCNS in Cherbourg on the English Channel.
Cabinet ministers and defence officials have already discussed the possibility of switching from diesel engines to nuclear power part-way through the construction contract, political, government and industry sources say.
The Coalition wants to keep the option open in case public opposition to nuclear power changes in the future. National polls taken from 2006 to 2009 found between 35 and 50 per cent of Australians supported introducing nuclear power, a study by the National Academies Forum showed.
DCNS, which is majority owned by the French government, is expected to start building the Australian submarines in Adelaide next decade. The last one might not be completed until 2050.
The other bidders for the contract, Germany’s Thyssenkrupp Marine Systems and Japan’s Kawasaki Heavy Industries and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, don’t make nuclear submarines………..
The government, which has been criticised for opting to build the submarines in Australia, said it was not considering switching to a nuclear-powered version………
Another drawback of nuclear reactors is that, unlike diesel motors, they can’t be turned off to make the submarine silent.
Australia’s submarines are unusual. They would be the only conventionally powered ones that used pump jets for propulsion rather than propellers, Stephan Fruehling, a defence expert at the Australian National University’s College of Asia and the Pacific, said.
The Coalition government quietly supports developing a nuclear industry in Australia and on Friday proposed storing radioactive waste on a remote South Australian cattle station.
It has encouraged the South Australian Labor government to push ahead with a debate over storing spent nuclear rods from overseas. Given the submarines will be built in Adelaide and South Australia has some of the largest uranium deposits in the world, the state could one day become the centre of an Australian nuclear industry. http://www.afr.com/business/manufacturing/coalition-plans-nuclearpowered-submarine-fleet-over-long-term-20160429-goieal
Were those French submarines chosen so that t they could later be NUCLEAR submarines?
Why did we agree to pay too much for French submarines? THE AUSTRALIAN
APRIL 29, 2016 Robert Gottliebsen,Business Spectator columnist Melbourne The evidence now mounting shows that the submarine tender is one of the most irregular ever conducted in Australia. Defence officials in the US, Japan and Germany are shocked at what is now being revealed.
Within 24 hours of the tender being announced, both sides are saying different thingsso, as anyone experienced with tenders knows, that means the deal has every prospect of becoming a disaster. (The good, the bad and the ugly of the submarine tender process, Apr 29)
There is mounting evidence that the French do not want to build the first two submarines in Australia. They need to make the first two submarines back home.
In Paris, they were shocked that Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull was so definitivein his statement that all 12 submarines would be built in Australia.
To understand how this bizarre situation developed and the implications that stem from it, we need to go back to the defence white paper which estimated the cost of the 12 submarines at $50bn (we learned later that this is an inflation-adjusted figure).
At the time, the Japanese were mystified because they knew their tender was less than half that and the German “all local” tender was even lower — probably under $20bn…….
Why would you need 4,000 French workers — three times the number of Australian workers required for the German bid — when 12 submarines are to be built in Australia?
The other strange aspect of the submarine tender is that the submarines are not going to be delivered until 2033 or 2034. The Germans were offering to have submarines available around 2028.
But maybe there was something about doing the deal with the French that has not been disclosed. Perhaps a group of defence officials believe longer term that Australia needs nuclear submarines because of their greater range. Given its 15 years before the first submarine arrives, everyone would have forgotten what Malcolm Turnbull said this week. Indeed, he will have retired.
To build a nuclear submarine in Australia requires a change in the legislation, and a nuclear industry, which we don’t have, although the climate is changing and South Australia looks set to become a nuclear hub.
When the tender was first announced, I noted that there might be a nuclear agenda but at that stage I had no idea of the tendering mess (Australia’s defence options open up, April 27).
If it’s a nuclear submarine that Australia wanted, then it would have only been fair the other tenderers know about it and be given an opportunity to include a nuclear option. http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/opinion/robert-gottliebsen/why-did-we-agree-to-pay-too-much-for-french-submarines/news-story/9ed179b276d13922c15d767873c6dea2
Submarines to Australia – the Australia-France “contract of the century”
In a possible signs of things to come, France’s ambassador to Australia, Christophe Lecourtier, said future ties would not just be limited to submarines.
Australia-French relations: from nuclear villains to submarine purveyors, AFR, 28 Apr 18, “……France winning, against hefty odds, the $50 billion contract to supply 12 French-designed submarines for the Australian Navy. State-controlled defence contractor DCNS won out over Germany’s ThysennKrupp Marine Systems and Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries to build 12 conventional submarines in Australia, a coup hailed by the French media as “the contract of the century”…… Continue reading
Petition against South Australia waste dump plan launched by USA Nuclear Information Service
Help stop A Global Mobile Chernobyl! Nuclear Information and Resource Service, 23 Apr 16, A group of politicians and businesspeople are developing a plan to build an international high-level nuclear waste dump in South Australia–a nation that has no commercial nuclear reactors. The plan is strongly opposed by many South Australians and by an overwhelming majority of Aboriginal people, who own the land.
The Australian Nuclear Free Alliance, representing Aboriginal people from across Australia, calls on nuclear nations NOT to dump nuclear waste in Australia. The nuclear industry has a track record of Aboriginal dispossession and environmental pollution–from atomic bomb tests to uranium mining to nuclear waste dump proposals.
NIRS is supporting our friends in Australia and we hope you, and your organization, will too, by signing on to a petition of support by going here. You can also learn more about the issue at this site.
Individuals: please sign the simple statement of support below.
Dear friends in the Australian Nuclear-Free Alliance community,
Thank you for your commitment to “Keep It in the Ground” by your efforts to stop uranium mining in your lands.
We stand with you. We, the people, must and will stop the dirty, deadly and deceptive nuclear industry. We have heard that your lands are now being targeted by global nuclear waste companies. We are the community of Nuclear Information and Resource Service supporters. Collectively and as individuals, we commit to speak out and act to prevent your home from becoming a dumping ground for global nuclear waste.
Our planet and our struggle is shared and NIRS and ANFA are stronger together.
Thank you for standing for health, hope and your home. We stand with you.
USA only – 847 signatures so far http://org2.salsalabs.com/o/5502/p/dia/action3/common/public/?action_KEY=22778
Australia cuts aid to Africa, encourages Ugly Australian Mining Companies
Last year, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists released a report called Fatal Extraction: Australian Mining Companies Digging a Deadly Footprint in Africa. It reported that Australian mining companies were the most rapidly expanding of all mining investors in Africa. From 2000 to 2009, prospecting licences held by Australian companies in Botswana alone increased from 14 to 260.
According to the report, Australian mining companies were responsible for multiple cases of negligence, unfair dismissal, violence and environmental law-breaking across Africa. It claims that since 2004 more than 380 people have died in mining accidents or in offsite skirmishes connected to Australian mining companies in 13 countries in Africa.
In comparison with Australia, African tax regulations are relatively flexible, while wages and working conditions, environmental protection, and occupational health and safety laws are weak.
Last year Foreign Minister Julie Bishop announced that the Australian government would actively promote the interests of the mining sector ahead of economic aid to Africa.
Australian miners in South Africa In the wake of a local activist’s murder, Australian mining interests in Africa are being called into question. https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/news/resources/2016/04/09/australian-miners-south-africa/14601240003106 PHILLIP WALKER 9 Apr 16 Thee assassination of South African community activist Sikhosiphi “Bazooka” Radebe was shocking but sadly not surprising.
On the night of his death – March 22 – Radebe had warned his colleagues in the Amadiba Crisis Committee of a hit list. An hour later, two men masquerading as police arrived at Radebe’s house and shot him eight times in the head.
Radebe had been opposing titanium mining at Xolobeni, on the ancestral land of the Pondo people on South Africa’s east coast. The mining company involved is Australian-based Mineral Commodities Limited.
At Radebe’s funeral last weekend, Chief Cinani, representing the Queen and the Royal House of the amaMpondo, criticised the government’s acceptance of Australian investment and investment from the Indian business family the Guptas. “I am blaming the government because the government gave permits for those Australians, while people were saying ‘no’ to the government . It is clear that the business community is ruling the government. It is not only about the Guptas. Now we have seen the Australians. People are coming here with huge sums of money to divide the people.”
Through its director, Mark Caruso, Mineral Commodities Limited (MRC) and its South African subsidiary, Transworld Energy & Minerals Resources (TEM), have long been in dispute with the Amadiba community. The latest tragedy marks an escalation of hostility in a conflict now entering its 10th year. Continue reading
It’s wrong to sell Australian uranium to critically unsafe Ukraine
The Zaporizhia nuclear facility is Europe’s largest and is only 200 kilometres from the conflict zone in eastern Ukraine. Some commentators have described nuclear plants in the region as pre-deployed nuclear targets and there have already been armed incursions during the recent conflict period.
Australia shouldn’t sell its uranium to Ukraine http://www.smh.com.au/comment/australia-shouldnt-sell-its-uranium-to-ukraine-20160331-gnv0no.html, Dave Sweeney, 31 Mar 16 Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop’s announcement this week to sell Australian uranium to Ukraine is an ill-advised and dangerous retreat from responsibility.
With timing and placement that a satirist could only dream of emulating – April Fool’s Day, the month of the 30th anniversary of the Chernobyl meltdown and while attending a nuclear security summit – Bishop is set to sign a uranium supply agreement this week with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko.
Australia, the country that directly fuelled Fukushima now plans to sell uranium to Ukraine, the country that gave the world Chernobyl – hardly a match made in heaven.
Thirty years ago the Chernobyl nuclear disaster spread fallout over large swathes of eastern and western Europe and five million people still live in contaminated areas in Belarus, Ukraine and Russia.
Serious containment and waste management issues remain at Chernobyl with a massive concrete shield now under construction in an attempt to enclose the stricken reactor complex and reduce the chances of further radioactive releases.
Against this backdrop there are deep concerns over those parts of the Ukrainian nuclear sector that are not yet infamous names, including very real security concerns about nuclear facilities being targeted in the current conflict with Russia. Continue reading
The country that fuelled Fukushima to sell uranium to the country that gave us Chernobyl
Australian Conservation Foundation, Dave Sweeney, 30 Mar 16 The Foreign Minister’s plan to sell Australian uranium to Ukraine is a dangerous retreat from responsibility, the Australian Conservation Foundation said today.
Foreign Minister Julie Bishop has announced she will sign an agreement this week with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko to supply Australian uranium to Ukraine.
“Australia, the country that directly fuelled Fukushima plans to sell uranium to Ukraine, the country that gave the world Chernobyl – this is hardly a match made in heaven,” said ACF nuclear free campaigner Dave Sweeney. “Thirty years since the Chernobyl nuclear disaster five million people still live in contaminated areas in Belarus, Ukraine and Russia.
“There remain serious containment and waste management issues at Chernobyl and there are very real security concerns about Ukrainian nuclear facilities being targeted in the current conflict with Russia.
“Australia has properly suspended uranium sales to Russia – it makes no sense to start selling uranium to Ukraine now.
“There can be no nuclear business-as-usual in the shadow of Fukushima – a disaster that was fuelled by Australian uranium.
“Following Fukushima the UN Secretary-General called for Australia to have a dedicated risk analysis of the impacts of the uranium sector – this has not happened and needs to.
“This deal and the recent deal with India – which was signed despite a recommendation by the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties (JSCOT) that Australia not supply uranium to India at this time or on these terms – are a dangerous retreat from responsibility.”
France, (and everybody else) touting sales of nuclear submarines to Australia
France pitches nuclear submarine option Sky News, , Thursday, 24 March 2016 “………As part of its sales pitch, DCNS is touting a nuclear growth path.
‘If, in 2050, Australia wants a nuclear submarine, they can design a nuclear submarine,’ DCNS chief executive Herve Guillou told AAP this week in Cherbourg. The DCNS bid offers Australia the eventual capability to come up with our own submarine whether nuclear or conventionally powered. Deputy chief executive Marie-Pierre De Bailliencourt says the Shortfin Barracuda was conceived from a vessel designed to nuclear standards, especially safety. That’s all way down the track.
In the meantime DCNS has to convince the Australian competitive evaluation process panel its proposal is better than those of Germany or Japan. German firm TKMS is proposing its 4000-tonne Type 216, a new design based on its widely exported Type 214. The Japanese government is offering its 4200-tonne Soryu-class boat, manufactured by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and Kawasaki Shipbuilding Corporation.
Of the three designs, only the Soryu actually exists and is in service with Japanese navy. However, it would still need substantial modifications to meet Australian requirements for range and endurance……….
This will be Australia’s biggest-ever defence procurement by a large distance, costing as much as $50 billion for acquisition and perhaps $150 billion through their life. Continue reading
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