Uranium sales condemned
By Anne Pavy
PERTH — At a media conference on June 21, the Greens (WA), the Medical Association for the Prevention of War, People for Nuclear Disarmament and Christian Centre for Social Action condemned the government's hypocritical stance on French nuclear testing.
Former senator Jo Vallentine urged the Australian government to invite other countries from the Asia-Pacific region to join it in sending naval vessels in a non-violent blockade of Moruroa.
The campaigners demanded that uranium sales to France be immediately stopped and that the Australian uranium mining industry be closed down. "The end product of nuclear power generation is plutonium, with a commercial nuclear reactor producing up to 250 kilograms per year. Plutonium is the fuel used to make nuclear bombs such as those to be tested in the Pacific. There is no guarantee that Australian uranium has not been used in the nuclear bombs exploded by France at Moruroa", Vallentine said.
Shane Guthrie from People for Nuclear Disarmament (PND) criticised the Australian government's weak stance and proposed that it tell the French government that it is not welcome as a "dialogue partner" at this year's South Pacific Forum meeting, to be held in Papua New Guinea in September.
PND has called on the government to support island countries which boycott the South Pacific Games in Tahiti in August and cease — not just freeze — all military cooperation with France.