27th Feb 2007, 3:43 PM – Senate Motions — Nuclear Weapons — No exporting to non—NPT parties, support support non—proliferation

The majority voted against a motion introduced by Australian Democrats Senator Lyn Allison, which means that it was rejected. The motion was:

That the Senate:

(a) notes the growing international concern regarding nuclear weapons proliferation, as shown by the:

(i) decision by the advisory board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, on 17 January 2007, to move the hands of the ‘Doomsday Clock’ from 7 minutes to midnight to 5 minutes to midnight,

(ii) statement by the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency and Nobel Peace prize winner Mohammed El Baradei, on 9 January 2007, stressing that ‘In addition to non-proliferation, it is also important to make progress on the second leg of the NPT – namely, the commitment by the nuclear weapon States to proceed in good faith towards complete nuclear disarmament’,

(iii) statements published in the Wall Street Journal of 4 January 2007, by Henry A Kissinger, George P Schultz, William J Perry and Senator Sam Nunn, emphasising the urgency of agreed practical steps to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons, and

(iv) statements by Kofi Annan, on 28 November 2006, and the Rome Summit of Peace Nobels, on 19 November 2006, emphasising the urgency of eliminating nuclear weapons; and

(b) calls on the Government to:

(i) review all existing uranium contracts with a view to ensuring that atoms of Australian uranium will never facilitate, in any way, nuclear weapons in any country,

(ii) give an assurance that uranium will never be exported to any state that is not an Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) signatory,

(iii) make representations to the United States of America (US), urging it to place greater importance not only on non-proliferation and counter-proliferation efforts, but also on its Article VI NPT obligation to achieve the total elimination of its nuclear arsenal,

(iv) press the US and China, in particular, to ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty, and

(v) continue its co-sponsorship of the resolution ‘Renewed determination towards the total elimination of nuclear weapons’, and support all other nuclear disarmament initiatives on the floor of the First Committee and General Assembly including the New Agenda resolution ‘Reducing Nuclear Danger’ and the annual Non-Aligned Movement resolution.