Evans' cynical game at World Court

By Peter Boyle If you were to judge from the front page headlines of Australia's daily newspapers, you'd believe that on October 30 — the first day of the International Court of Justice hearing in The Hague on the legality of nuclear weapons — foreign minister Gareth Evans argued for the elimination of nuclear weapons. But according to June Low of the Medical Association for Prevention of War (MAPW) and the World Court Project, while Evans' oral presentation played to this popular sentiment, Canberra's official submission was that the court not find nuclear weapons illegal. Evans was careful to point out later: "Nothing I have said today should be regarded as impacting on any alliance relationship we have with the US or anybody else". In short, Australia would continue to be part of the US nuclear war fighting system, through the bases at Pine Gap and Nurrungar. In 1993, the ICJ was asked by the World Health Organisation to give an advisory opinion on whether the use of nuclear weapons would violate international law. In 1994, the United Nations General Assembly extended the question to whether the threat or use of nuclear weapons in any circumstances was permitted under international law. Australia was the first of 25 governments to make statements in the hearing which will last until November 15. Aboriginal anti-nuclear activist Joan Wingfield (from the Kokotha community whose traditional lands cover the Maralinga and Roxby Downs areas) was flown to The Hague by MAPW and the World Court Project. But she told Green Left Weekly that she was not allowed to be part of the Australian delegation. "I am an indigenous person from an area where they have tested atomic bombs, mine uranium and dump nuclear waste. Except for the processing of uranium, the Kokotha people have every part of the nuclear chain occurring in our lands. I feel that I should have been allowed to present my case against nuclear weapons as my people are the ones who are suffering because of the nuclear industry. Wingfield said Evans' call for the elimination of nuclear weapons would have been more credible if he had included a date. "If Australia was fair dinkum about the abolition of nuclear weapons then we should be an example to the rest of the world and immediately declare Australia a nuclear-free zone. This would include no more uranium mining or visits to our ports of nuclear ships." In written submissions to the ICJ, the five declared nuclear powers — the US, Britain, Russia, France and China — have argued that the use and threatened use of nuclear weapons is legal. On October 31, the French and British governments declared that both would be willing to launch a first strike with nuclear weapons to defend their "vital interests". They are even willing to launch "atomic warning shots" against a perceived aggressor. New so-called low-yield nuclear weapons have been developed for this purpose. One of the objectives of the current round of French nuclear tests is to perfect such weapons. The US government has also announced that six underground tests, involving nuclear weapons, will take place in Nevada in 1996 and 1997, arguing that these are necessary to keep their nuclear arsenal "safe". The first test, code named "Rebound" is scheduled for June 18, 1996, according to the US Department of Energy. These will most likely be "hydro-nuclear" tests, according to Greenpeace, involving high explosives and nuclear materials like plutonium. Such tests are claimed to have no nuclear yield, as no chain reaction is initiated. However, they can produce a small fission yield. Greenpeace's Jean McSorley said on November 2 that the US announcement "could be a death knell for the test ban talks, due to [conclude] early next year. It might also lead to other states, like Russia and the UK, resuming testing."