Australia should provide no military support to Ukraine and should remove the United States from key defence facilities, the newly elected Greens leader David Shoebridge has said.
The NSW senator said the Greens would seek a major overhaul of the US-Australia alliance, including renegotiating the 1951 ANZUS treaty and ending American access to facilities such as the Pine Gap surveillance base.
Shoebridge, who won the partyroom leadership ballot on Wednesday after Larissa Waters stepped down because of kidney disease, said he would retain responsibility for the Greens’ defence and foreign affairs portfolios.
Greens oppose military aid to Ukraine
“The Greens have been clear from day one that we’re a party of peace and non-violence, and we don’t support military aid to the Ukraine,” Shoebridge said.
He said the party opposed weapons transfers as a matter of principle, while supporting “basic humanitarian and civil assistance” for Ukraine and efforts to combat corruption.
Shoebridge said the Greens would support military aid if it were authorised by a United Nations Security Council resolution, but acknowledged that Russia would be able to veto such a measure.
Australia has provided more than $1.6 billion in military assistance to Ukraine since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, including tanks, infantry fighting vehicles and ammunition.
US defence facilities under scrutiny
Shoebridge said American long-range bombers should not be based in the Northern Territory, nuclear-powered submarines should not use Western Australian facilities, and the US should lose access to Pine Gap, near Alice Springs.
“The US military bases aren’t making us safe; they’re making us a target … in a war that we will almost certainly have no agency in deciding whether it started or not, and will be dragged into simply because we’re the real estate that the United States wants to fight it from,” he said.
He also criticised the AUKUS nuclear-powered submarine pact, arguing that campaigning against the agreement could win votes at the next federal election.
Shoebridge said defence had become a significant opportunity for the Greens because of spending and what he described as broad agreement between Labor, the Coalition and One Nation on national security policy.
“The reason why we’ve gone down this bizarre rabbit hole of AUKUS to spend hundreds of billions of dollars on these unicorn nuclear submarines that are unlikely to happen, and the reason why we’re sort of bending the knee to Donald Trump, is because of this stultifying consensus between Labor and the Coalition and One Nation on defence,” he said.
The Greens leader also intends to continue campaigning for the legalisation of recreational cannabis, describing it as unreasonable for Australians to be treated as criminals for choosing cannabis rather than alcohol.
