From Independent and Peaceful Australia Network (IPAN)
Australia’s Pine Gap facility is an important component of the United Sates military in Australia, and there have been allegations for a long time that it has been used again and again in both spying and the carrying out of crimes against humanity in third countries.
Its functions are necessary to triangulate positions for seaborne and air attacks, and the targets have at times been civilians.
This has negative implications for Australia’s place in the community of nations and puts a question mark on Australia’s sovereignty.
“These revelations, reported in The Independent (7 February 2020), remind us yet again of the role which the US spy facility at Pine Gap in Central Australia plays in US drone missile operations and Australia’s complicity in these US atrocities through hosting this US facility,” stated IPAN spokesperson, Stephen Daley.
Whistle-blower Brandon Bryant was enlisted in the US Air Force for six years, where he operated Predator drones , remotely firing missiles at targets more than 7,000 miles away from the small room containing his workspace near Las Vegas, Nevada.
Brandon Bryant: I believe I killed a child in a drone strike
Video from BBC HARDtalk
Mr Bryant described reaching his breaking point with the US military after killing a child in Afghanistan that his superiors told him was “a dog” and he described the American military as ‘worse than the Nazis’.
“The U.S. Pine Gap facility which receives images from U.S. military satellites, provides targeting information for this illegal U.S. drone assassination program enabling the atrocities about which Mr Bryant speaks”, stated Mr Daley
“By hosting this U.S. base on our soil Australia is assisting this illegal program and becomes an accomplice to the atrocities and war crimes for which it is responsible. IPAN repeats its call on the government to close this U.S. base and extricate Australia from involvement in U.S. drone assassination atrocities”, stated Mr Daley
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