UNESCO reef threat a political exercise in hypocrisy
MEDIA RELEASE
1 July 2021
UNESCO’s recent threat to list the Great Barrier Reef as ‘in danger’ serves as a stellar example of much that is wrong with the United Nations experiment and Australia’s capitulation to international climate change ideology.
One Nation leader Senator Pauline Hanson said the threat from the China-chaired World Heritage Committee body was motivated by petty politics.
“This is an obvious threat which is based on Australia-bashing politics, not on an honest assessment of the state of the Great Barrier Reef,” Senator Hanson said. “The committee hasn’t even bothered to have a look for itself.
“Queensland tourism operators who have skin in the game know the reef is doing just fine. This is a very important industry for Queensland and it must not be sacrificed to the political whims of the unaccountable UN and unaccountable Chinese regime.
“This is China seeking to punish Australia for not towing the communist regime’s line. The hypocrisy of the world’s largest emitter (responsible for around 29% of global emissions) dictating what we must do to address climate change is appalling and should be called out for what it is.
“China is one of the most polluted countries in the world. Its people don’t trust the safety of food produced in China, and recruit buyers in nations like Australia to send our quality produce back there. We’ve all seen the reports of these buyers sweeping up every can of infant formula in our supermarkets, ignoring or evading purchase limits and leaving Australian households short.
“We’ve all seen the reports of China’s surveillance, its interference in our domestic politics, and its attempts to suppress our freedom of speech. We all know it is holding small countries as financial hostages to its insidious ‘belt and road’ scheme. We’ve all seen how China corrupted the World Health Organisation to avoid scrutiny over its culpability for the COVID-19 pandemic. China’s credibility is in the toilet.”
Senator Hanson said it was typical of the UN to allow a nation with such a poor environmental record like China to lead organisations like UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee.
“This is the same unaccountable organisation which put Muammar Gaddafi’s Libya in charge of its human rights commission,” she said. “How can anyone possibly have confidence in the UN when it does things like maintaining the pure fiction that China is still a ‘developing’ nation, giving it all the leniency China requires to keep increasing emissions while other economies are crippled by the billions of dollars wasted to appease climate change zealots.
“We are already spending billions of taxpayer dollars protecting the reef. This threat is a great example of an ideology which carefully picks easy targets like Australia and ignores the true culprits.
“The Morrison Government, the Greens and Labor are on notice: they answer to the Australian people and not unelected, unaccountable international bodies like the UN or UNESCO trying to undermine our national sovereignty. This is our reef and this is our country. Australians – and only Australians – should have a say in how we look after our reef and run our affairs.”
