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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 1 Hansard (19 February) . . Page.. 242 ..

MR STEFANIAK (continuing):

Ms Tucker goes on about the brutality against innocent civilians. What about the brutality that this man brought against his own innocent civilians for those 20 years, the one million to two million people he has killed? Mr Hargreaves was going on about a number of things. He spoke about the Americans being trigger-happy and referred to the Cuban missile crisis. Missiles were pointed directly at the United States from Cuba and I think that the Americans acted very responsibly then.

Mr Hargreaves was right in saying that nuclear bombs have been used once before. That was to end the war against Japan, which would have resulted in the death of about three or four million Japanese, plus half a million allied service men and women, had they not been used. No-one has done anything like that since.

Saddam Hussein is a threat. I am amazed at Ms Tucker's motion in that it starts off by referring to opposing the proposed war in Iraq and withdrawing our troops in the Middle East immediately for the reason that there is no clear evidence that Iraq poses an immediate threat to Australia or our allies. Mr Pratt has indicated the extent of the threat and the links between Iraq and various terrorist groups. Tell that to Iran, which Saddam Hussein invaded in 1980 when that nation was in chaos. Tell that to Kuwait, which he invaded in 1991. Tell that to the Saudis, whose country he invaded very briefly before he was thrown out. It is quite ludicrous to say that there is no immediate threat to our allies. Tell that to Israelis on whom he was dropping a few of his missiles in 1991.

Technically speaking, maybe the Kuwaitis and the Israelis are not our allies. The Kuwaitis certainly were in 1991; we went in to help liberate their country. As to there being no clear or immediate threat to Australia or its allies, this man has numerous weapons of mass destruction. The UNSCOM report in 1998 indicated that there was a substantial arsenal of chemical and biological weapons, including 360 tonnes of bulk chemical warfare agents, 1.5 tonnes of VX nerve agents, up to 3,000 tonnes of precursor chemicals, enough growth media to produce 25,500 litres of anthrax spores and over 30,000 special munitions.

That was four years ago. Today, weapons inspectors have identified further Iraqi chemical and biological weapons unaccounted for, including 6,500 chemical bombs with about 1,000 tonnes of chemical agents, some 122-millimetre chemical rocket warheads, laboratory quantities of thiodiglycol, a precursor for mustard gas, indications that VX agents have been weaponised and some additional missiles which go far beyond what they are meant to do. Iraq has an horrendous amount of horrible, nasty weapons of mass destruction. We know Iraq has produced anthrax, botulinium toxin and aflatoxins rich in biological agents and the means for delivering them. What is more, we know that they have been used.

Even at the height of the Cold War when there was a mutual stand-off between the United States and its allies and the Soviet Union, the Soviet Union was never irresponsible enough, or perhaps even wicked enough, to use weapons of mass destruction. This man actually has and has indicated that he would have absolutely no compulsion to do so and will do so against his own people or anyone else. He has associated with various terrorist groups. He pays the families of terrorist groups in Israel and Palestine $25,000 for every suicide bomber who blows up himself and other people.

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