Michael Danby (Melbourne Ports, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Commentators have spent a lot of time focusing on the situation in Syria and western Iraq, with the atrocities committed by Daesh, yet dangerous gains by Iran seem to slip under the radar. Iran, as most people in this House would know, has diligently been pursuing nuclear weapons for years, in violation of its treaty commitments and despite ongoing negotiations with the US, the UK, France and Germany to prevent break-out capacity. Iran's military aid to its friends has allowed Iran to accumulate incredible influence in four regional capitals—Beirut, Damascus, Baghdad and, most recently, Sana'a, in Yemen—to the detriment of those who want to resist Iranian hegemony in that region.

That Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons capability is blindingly obvious. Report after report from the International Atomic Energy Agency—the UN's nuclear agency—have highlighted discoveries of things that are only used in weaponisation programs. UN inspectors, who, according to the NPT, should have unfettered access to all nuclear sites, are regularly barred from entering. In response to these breaches of the NPT, the Security Council has passed numerous sanctions against Iran. The Security Council sanctions, as well as autonomous sanctions imposed by numerous countries—including, I am very proud to say, this country, under the previous government, supported by the then opposition, now government—slowed down Iran's progress. They did not stop it.

A military strike against Iran was looking dangerously possible. In an effort to avoid violence, President Obama launched negotiations with Iran and these negotiations, clearly preferable to violence, will need to keep in mind what the purpose of these negotiations were. As far as I understood, Australia never agreed to Iran keeping 10,000 centrifuges or a ballistic missile program. The objective of the negotiations was to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons capability and the means to deliver it. Unfortunately, as time has marched on the objectives of these negotiations appear to have morphed more into a desire to achieve an agreement, regardless of the consequences. Or, as the Washington Post recently put it:

… a process that began with the goal of eliminating Iran's potential to produce nuclear weapons has evolved into a plan to tolerate and temporarily restrict that capability.

This is not something I have signed up to, it is not something the Australian people have signed up to and it is not something, as far as I know, this parliament had signed up to. This evolution has occurred because Iran has stuck to its objective of acquiring nuclear weapons capability and has been inflexible in negotiations. Negotiators have bent over backwards in a desire to achieve consensus with Iran; they keep offering it compromises. Iran pockets those compromises, and then demands more. When, in five or 10 years, intelligence emerges that Iran has achieved a nuclear breakout capacity, the fault will lie in part with this policy of trying to achieve agreement at all costs.

Veteran US commentator Walter Russell Mead said he had noticed there were a number of very influential US foreign policy advisers who have expressed concern about the way the negotiations are developing. Mead writes:

What's interesting is that the growing disquiet about our Iran policy isn't over the basic decision to negotiate with Iran … It is about how to ensure that those negotiations advance important American interests.

He says:

The debate over Iran negotiations is really a debate over Middle East strategy …

I could not agree with Mr Mead or the Washington Post editorial more. To accept Iran as a regional hegemon, as we did with the Soviet Union during the Cold War, is a mistake. The Washington Post said the US:

… has declined to counter increasingly aggressive efforts by Iran to extend its influence across the Middle East and seems ready to concede Teheran a place as a regional [hegemon]—

Everyone knows that Iran founded, funds and directs Hezbollah. Hezbollah, which is the political party with a private army in Lebanon, has a veto over the Lebanese government and is now fighting in Syria. Iran has long backed Syria as well with the 200,000 deaths that have taken place over there. Iran has enormous sway over Iraq, a fact which should be seen as a defeat for our common Western interests. Most recently, Iran's rebels have overrun the Yemeni capital and deposed its president.

It is very important to notice all of these things, to notice the continuing bellicosity of its leadership and to be fearful of its nuclear weapons capability, the 10,000 centrifuges that seem to be at the centre of this agreement and above all its ballistic— (Time expired)