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Australia has lost its moral compass on nuclear disarmament and non proliferation

despite the window of opportunity that Australia has open to it as chair of a number of relevant committees on the UN Security Council, Carr’s recent statements are devoid of any talk of global disarmament, or of a just dialogue between Iran, Israel and the West. The Australian government instead seems intent on reforging the policy bonds of the “Coalition of the Willing” which proved so morally, politically and economically disastrous in 2003.

Julia Gillard must not continue to take Australia further down the path of moral decay in the area of non-proliferation and disarmament as I’ve elsewhere argued she has done. Now on the Security Council, Australia must use its role to push for what Prime Minster Gillard herself promised in the candidate brochure:

… a lead role in advancing disarmament and non-proliferation efforts and continuing our longstanding efforts to promote respect for international law.

The decay of Australia’s nuclear ethic, Aljazeera, NAJ Taylor, 26 Jan 13, Australia must use its new position in the UN Security Council to push for conciliation with Iran.  Within three days of Australia taking the chair of the UN Security Council committees overseeing “Iran’s WMD proliferation activities”, Foreign Minister Bob Carr announced that Australia is to adopt severe economic sanctions against Iran that are “broadly aligned” with those already actioned by the US, Britain and European Union.

Thursday’s announcement is bitterly disappointing, for it draws to the fore a deep moral inconsistency in Australia’s recent nuclear dealings.

Simply put, Iran is alleged to have an active nuclear weapons programme, despite it having undertaken a number of international obligations – including the primary instrument of the nuclear regime, the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

By contrast, Israel has never been a state party to the Treaty, and has possessed a nuclear weapons capability since the late 1960s, yet receives billions of dollars in funding from the US for its conventional weapons programmes a year. India – another liberal democracy – first acquired nuclear weapons in 1998 after it had signed the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test Ban Treaty, yet later scored a nuclear technology transfer deal with the US in 2008, followed byrelated moves by Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard to open up uranium sales to India only last year.

Put another way: Iran is under a greater level of scrutiny for allegedly pursuing a nuclear weapons capability than either Israel or India have been for having a readily-deployable nuclear arsenal. As Australian National University researcher and former assistant secretary-general of the UN Ramesh Thakur pointed out last week, economic sanctions like those outlined by Bob Carr:

… cause death and destruction through structural violence – starvation, malnutrition, the spread of deadly diseases, curtailed access to medicines that can exceed the cleaner alternative of war. John Mueller and Karl Mueller argued in Foreign Affairs that sanctions caused more deaths in the 20th century than all weapons of mass destruction throughout history.

What of the ‘international community’?  

Carr’s statement would have you believe that Iran is acting out of step with “the international community”. The truth is otherwise. Apart from the allowances made to India and Israel, the five recognised nuclear weapons states (US, UK, China, Russia and France) have since 1967 left largely unfulfilled their disarmament promise under Article 6 of the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

For all the hope and swagger with which Obama called for “a world without nuclear weapons” when he assumed the presidency, very little has been achieved……..

The nuclear weapons states of the UK and US have not done enough to justify the continued double-standard which sees them using nuclear weapons as a daily deterrent, as well as increasingly permitting more and more agreeable members such as Israel and India within the nuclear club……..

Japan and Australia, have historically been recognised leaders in pursuing the disarmament agenda.

But the case of Iran is changing all that.

Iran: ‘Atomic energy for all, nuclear weapons for none’

Without question, Iran must be able to acquire nuclear energy without undue international pressure. Very few publicly contest that. The issue is that many contend that Iran is in fact seeking a nuclear weapon of their own.

We therefore find ourselves in an untenable situation not too dissimilar to that which Iraq faced under Saddam: prove that you don’t have what you say you don’t have!……..

Australia’s moral decay

And yet despite the window of opportunity that Australia has open to it as chair of a number of relevant committees on the UN Security Council, Carr’s recent statements are devoid of any talk of global disarmament, or of a just dialogue between Iran, Israel and the West. The Australian government instead seems intent on reforging the policy bonds of the “Coalition of the Willing” which proved so morally, politically and economically disastrous in 2003.

Julia Gillard must not continue to take Australia further down the path of moral decay in the area of non-proliferation and disarmament as I’ve elsewhere argued she has done. Now on the Security Council, Australia must use its role to push for what Prime Minster Gillard herself promised in the candidate brochure:

… a lead role in advancing disarmament and non-proliferation efforts and continuing our longstanding efforts to promote respect for international law.

And given the role of Australian media – and Rupert Murdoch in particular – in manufacturing the WMD threat posed by Saddam in 2003, reporting on “the Iran nuclear issue” must proactively solicit a range of opinions and expertise before again blindly calling for economic or military harm to be committed against the people of Iran.

There’s simply no other peaceful – or moral – way forward. http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/01/2013121122928381198.html

January 28, 2013 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA, weapons and war