Australian unionist backs call for trade sanctions against Singapore to save condemned man
- From: "Chim" <ChimS1@xxxxxxx>
- Date: 28 Nov 2005 02:33:25 -0800
Australian unionist backs call for trade sanctions against Singapore to
save condemned man
By ROD McGUIRK, AP
CANBERRA, Australia (AP) - The leader of Australia's trade union
movement said Monday that unionists stood ready to impose trade
sanctions against Singapore and urged the government to take stronger
steps to save the life of an Australian drug trafficker who is to be
hanged by the city-state on Friday.
But Australian Council of Trade Unions President Sharan Burrow said the
unions are unable to take unilateral action against Singapore to save
Nguyen Tuong Van, 25, without the support of the wider community.
"There is no question that the death penalty is barbaric, that it is a
travesty of human rights, but I don't think that the union movement, to
be honest, can save this one," Burrow told Australian Broadcasting
Corp. radio.
"We would stand ready to take action if the nation decided to up the
ante," she said, calling for a "a united front."
Singapore has rejected repeated clemency pleas - including from the
Australian government - for the Vietnam-born Australian, who was
arrested at Singapore's Changi Airport in 2002 en route from Cambodia
to Australia's southern city of Melbourne carrying 396 grams (14
ounces) of heroin.
Australian Prime Minister John Howard said there is no hope of having
the death sentence commuted to a life term after his Singaporean
counterpart Lee Hsien Loong rebuffed his fifth appeal for clemency over
the weekend.
The prime minister said he warned Lee that the execution would spawn
lingering resentment between the close allies who have been free trade
partners since 2003.
The minor opposition Greens Party has urged Canberra to suspend
military ties with Singapore and consider trade sanctions against
Australia's largest trade and investment partner in Southeast Asia.
Howard and senior ministers have already ruled out trade sanctions,
saying they would be economically harmful to both countries while
achieving nothing for Nguyen.
Foreign Minister Alexander Downer on Monday rejected criticisms that
the government had moved too slowly and had not done enough to save his
life.
The government first raised Nguyen's case at ministerial level with
Singapore four days after his arrest in December 2002 and argued for
the charge to be downgraded to avoid a death sentence in November 2003
before he even stood trial, Downer told parliament.
Downer also sought the opinion of Cambridge University's Professor of
International Law James Crawford when government lawyers advised that
the death penalty could not be challenged in the International Court of
Justice without Singapore accepting the intervention.
"The fact is that an enormous number of representations have been
made," Downer said.
Howard rejected opposition calls to send Downer and opposition Labor
Party foreign affairs spokesman Kevin Rudd to Singapore to make a final
bipartisan plea for clemency.
"It's not going to achieve any purpose other than perhaps raise the
false expectation that something is going to change," Howard told ABC
radio.
11/27/05 23:45 EST
Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. The information contained in the
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distributed without the prior written authority of The Associated
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