BY DANNY FAIRFAX
CANBERRA Braving near-zero temperatures, 100 people assembled outside the entrance of the National Convention Centre from 8am on June 24 to protest against the 2003 Defence and Industry conference.
The conference is staged annually by the Department of Defence as a forum for the Australian government and international weapons manufacturers to discuss the tendering and purchase of weapons and infrastructure for the Australian military. It thus acts as a fulcrum for the military-industrial complex in this country
The conference was attended by 1500 delegates from corporations such as Australian Defence Industries (the formerly government-owned monopoly of the Australian arms industry now 50% owned by French corporation Thales), British Aerospace and the "big four" US weapons manufacturers Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and TRW.
Of the government's $14.3 billion military budget, 20-30% will go to arms procurement. The protesters called for this money to instead be spent restoring funding to public health care and education, and for an end to the Australian government's support for Washington's global war drive.
The protest outside the conference, which was organised by Global Justice Canberra, was addressed by several speakers, including ACT Greens MP Kerry Tucker, Australian National University environment collective member Benjo Keaney, and Socialist Alliance activist James Vassilopoulos.
"Canberrans do not want these corporations meeting in our city. We protested in record numbers in February and March against the war in Iraq. But these corporations didn't just want that war, they needed it in order to please their shareholders", said Vassilopoulos, who is also the convener of ACT Network Against War, the main anti-war coalition in Canberra.
Protester numbers were boosted by a contingent from Sydney's Acehnese community, who came to demand the government condemn Indonesia's war in Aceh. They later took their protest to the Indonesian embassy.
Defence minister Robert Hill, who made the conference's keynote address at 8.45am, was harangued by the protesters as he entered and left the convention centre.
The subsequent day's media beat-up labelled the protest a "security scare", with the Melbourne Age claiming the demonstrators had "pounded the bonnet of Senator Hill's car, bent the aerial, and splattered a window with what appeared to be paint". However, even former SAS commander Jim Wallace admitted that "to have the level of security that would be required to stop something like that happening would turn us into a police state".
From Green Left Weekly, July 2, 2003.
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