Former UN chief weapons inspector Hans Blix accused Australia of caving in to US pressure to join the Iraq war and called on Canberra to be more independent of Washington, in an interview published yesterday.
Blix told the Sydney Morning Herald that he believed Australia should have displayed more independence over the US-led invasion of Iraq, although he believed it was difficult for Canberra to stand up to Washington.
"It may not be easy to be independent vis-a-vis the US because they are so tremendously powerful, but [Australia] ought to be," he said in an interview to publicize his memoirs.
Blix said sovereign nations needed to display independence on questions of war and peace, and it would be improper for any country to bow to US pressure to join a war in return for favorable treatment in other areas.
"The US might well go to some small country and say `Look, you don't have interest in Iraq but you have one big interest in the world and that is to be friendly to us, so are you going to vote for your interest or not?'" he said.
A spokesman for Prime Minister John Howard dismissed the criticism and said Australia had been right to join the Iraq invasion.
"I reject the criticism that Australia bowed to US pressure," the spokesman said. "It was right for Australia to be involved in the coalition.
"Understandably, as leader of it, Han Blix had wanted the UN weapons inspection process to continue," the spokesman said.
Australia was one of Washington's strongest supporters in the lead-up to last year's Iraq war and one of only a handful of members of the so-called "coalition of the willing" to contribute troops on the ground.
Howard and Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said this month that maintaining a strong alliance with the US was a factor in the decision to commit 2,000 troops to the Iraq campaign.
The relationship would have been "very substantially" weakened had Australia not done so, they said.
Australia has long battled perceptions that it acts as Washington's "deputy sheriff" in the Asia-Pacific region and last week urged the US to take a more active role in providing financial and training support in counter-terrorism efforts in Southeast Asia.
Far from the violence ravaging Haiti, a market on the border with the Dominican Republic has maintained a welcome degree of normal everyday life. At the Dajabon border gate, a wave of Haitians press forward, eager to shop at the twice-weekly market about 200km from Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince. They are drawn by the market’s offerings — food, clothing, toys and even used appliances — items not always readily available in Haiti. However, with gang violence bad and growing ever worse in Haiti, the Dominican government has reinforced the usual military presence at the border and placed soldiers on alert. While the market continues to
An image of a dancer balancing on the words “China Before Communism” looms over Parisian commuters catching the morning metro, signaling the annual return of Shen Yun, a controversial spectacle of traditional Chinese dance mixed with vehement criticism of Beijing and conservative rhetoric. The Shen Yun Performing Arts company has slipped the beliefs of a spiritual movement called Falun Gong in between its technicolored visuals and leaping dancers since 2006, with advertising for the show so ubiquitous that it has become an Internet meme. Founded in 1992, Falun Gong claims nearly 100 million followers and has been subject to “persistent persecution” in
ONLINE VITRIOL: While Mo Yan faces a lawsuit, bottled water company Nongfu Spring and Tsinghua University are being attacked amid a rise in nationalist fervor At first glance, a Nobel prize winning author, a bottle of green tea and Beijing’s Tsinghua University have little in common, but in recent weeks they have been dubbed by China’s nationalist netizens as the “three new evils” in the fight to defend the country’s valor in cyberspace. Last month, a patriotic blogger called Wu Wanzheng filed a lawsuit against China’s only Nobel prize-winning author, Mo Yan (莫言), accusing him of discrediting the Communist army and glorifying Japanese soldiers in his fictional works set during the Japanese invasion of China. Wu, who posts online under the pseudonym “Truth-Telling Mao Xinghuo,” is seeking
‘SURPRISES’: The militants claim to have successfully tested a missile capable of reaching Mach 8 and vowed to strike ships heading toward the Cape of Good Hope Yemen’s Houthi rebels claim to have a new, hypersonic missile in their arsenal, Russia’s state media reported on Thursday, potentially raising the stakes in their attacks on shipping in the Red Sea and surrounding waterways against the backdrop of Israel’s war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The report by the state-run RIA Novosti news agency cited an unidentified official, but provided no evidence for the claim. It comes as Moscow maintains an aggressively counter-Western foreign policy amid its grinding war on Ukraine. However, the Houthis have for weeks hinted about “surprises” they plan for the battles at sea to counter the