Don’t Bomb Iran

summary: Australia further strengthens its opposition to multilateral
agreements, saying US should be free to act without global consensus
against proliferators and missile attacks. Some countries should be not be
allowed to have ANY nuclear technologies, peaceful or not.

see also
http://www.foreignminister.gov.au/transcripts/2004/040223_lowy.html

full article below

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http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/02/23/1077497518086.html

Australia backs US as world’s nuclear sheriff
By Cynthia Banham
February 24, 2004

Australia has aligned itself more strongly with the United States on nuclear
proliferation, declaring that the superpower should be free to act without the
need for global consensus against the threat of ballistic missile attack.

In a tough statement in which he dismissed the “status quo of non-
proliferation measures” as unacceptable, the Foreign Minister, Alexander
Downer, yesterday called for “new thinking” on the issue.

He called for a new United Nations Security Council resolution that would
require states to criminalise proliferation and a sign a tougher Nuclear Non-
Proliferation Treaty that would deny some countries even peaceful nuclear
technology.

Mr Downer’s speech to the Lowy Institute in Sydney entrenched the
Government’s rejection of a multilateral, UN-style consensus approach to
global security problems.

Gone were the days when “Canberra Commission-style talkfests are an
acceptable or effective counter-proliferation outcome”, he said, referring to
the Keating-era Canberra Commission on Elimination of Nuclear Weapons.

The challenge was to “go beyond the constraints imposed by consensus
decision-making to lift the standards of compliance and enforcement” in the
existing nuclear non-proliferation regime.

The threat from the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction was not
“some theorist’s apocalyptic vision of the future” and must be confronted
directly with actions and not merely “talk”, Mr Downer said.

Citing the recent confession by Pakistan’s nuclear weapons program founder,
Abdul Qadeer Khan, that he had given Iran, North Korea and Libya nuclear
secrets, Mr Downer said it did not “take a great leap” to imagine terrorists
could acquire the weapons.

In a break with orthodoxy, he said a strengthening of the international rules
and diplomatic arrangements to counter proliferation should include a
“stronger” Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in which some countries should
be denied access even to peaceful nuclear technology.

In language echoing recent comments of US President George Bush, Mr
Downer said the treaty’s current guarantee of access to peaceful nuclear
energy carried with it “unacceptable risk”.

The Government’s new approach would focus on two other key areas.
Australia would strengthen its support of the US-inspired Proliferation Security
Initiative, which involves the interception of suspected nuclear shipments, and
would back Mr Bush’s wish to expand its operation through the use of
Interpol.

Mr Downer also reiterated Australia’s decision to participate in the US’s
ballistic missile defence system, saying the governments expected to sign a
memorandum of agreement this year detailing the scope of that co-operation.

He defended the system against charges it would spark an arms race.
People”sex up what missile defence is about. It is about defence, not building
nukes to fire at other people.” The Government “firmly believes it is
unreasonable to deny the US - and its allies - the right to defend its cities
against ballistic missile attack”, he said.

The Opposition has refused to back any involvement in the ballistic missile
system. The Labor leader, Mark Latham, said yesterday it gave rise to “a
whole range of concerns about nuclear proliferation in the region”.

The head of the Australian National University’s department of international
relations, Dr Chris Reus-Smit, said there were “real risks” that the initiatives
outlined by Mr Downer would undermine, not strengthen, nuclear non-
proliferation arrangements.

“The Howard Government has been silent on the Bush Administration’s own
accelerated nuclear program . . . and now it wishes to compromise non-
nuclear states’ right to free access to nuclear technology for peaceful
purposes,” he said.

This story was found at:
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/02/23/1077497518086.html