Nick McKim (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of Senator Wong's response to Senator Shoebridge's question today.

The war that's being perpetrated on Iran as we speak by the rogue states of the United States and Israel is profoundly and deeply distressing—just to think of the thousands of innocent people, the men, women and children, who are suffering, who've been injured or who've been killed, and no doubt the tens of thousands more, at least, to come as the besuited, genocidal war criminals Trump and Netanyahu promote and conduct an obviously and blatantly illegal war. It's not just distressing; the illegality is clear. It is clear. The test established by international law was never met, and there has never been such an abject failure to meet the test required by international law.

We know that how we got here was that the world sat by and watched while Israel conducted a genocide in Gaza, while tens of thousands of people were mass murdered by Israel, with the complicity of the United States and Australia. The lesson here is, if you empower bullies, if you empower genocidal fascists, if you empower war criminals, then that will embolden them and they will take the next step, and that's exactly what has happened here.

The question needs to be asked: what is Australia's role in this war on Iran? We know that US planes, part of the war machine, flew from Diego Garcia base to Australia just a few days ago, and, when Foreign Minister Wong was asked about that in question time today, she did not or could not rule out that those planes had been used in the conduct of the war against Iran. And Pine Gap is undoubtedly being used in real time to relay intel and to relay comms that are being used in an illegal war against Iran. A ship was sunk yesterday in the Indian Ocean—an Iranian ship, illegally sunk by the United States of America, that had just left from conducting a friendship visit to India,. It was sunk and then the surviving crew were abandoned to drown by the United States—contrary, I might add, to article 18 of the Geneva convention. What is Australia's role in this barbarity? What is Australia's role in this abandonment of the so-called rules based international order?

I'll tell you what Australia's role is. We saw it laid bare in question time today by Senator Wong when she made this vague assertion that somehow the ship that was illegally sunk by the US in the Indian Ocean was apparently targeting some unnamed people. Well, I'll tell you what: we remember the lies that underpinned the invasion of Iraq. We remember those lies, and I'm calling it out again. This current war is being conducted on the basis of a lie, just as the Iraq war was conducted on the basis of the lie of weapons of mass destruction.

Let's turn to Australia's domestic politics. You could have looked at Senator Pauline Hanson's tweet on the day of the invasion. You could have crossed out 'Senator Hanson' and put in 'Prime Minister Albanese', and no-one could have told the difference, because the talking points were identical. The war parties in this place are the Labor Party, the coalition and One Nation.

But I'll tell you what: the Greens are here to say the killing has to stop. The Greens are here to say that international law needs to be abided by. We say the lives of Palestinian children and Iranian children actually matter. We say Australia should not be dragged into yet another catastrophic war on the other side of the planet. We say it is time to end the bloodshed now. We say: let's separate ourselves from being vassal states, lickspittles and bootlickers to the United States and Israel. Let's have a genuinely independent foreign policy. Let's end the Scott Morrison brain fart of AUKUS and genuinely act in Australia's best interests, not in the interests of the military-industrial complex.

Helen Polley (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator, take your seat, please. I will ask you to use, for former prime ministers, their title. You may be very passionate, but you still need to show respect in this chamber.

Question agreed to.