Page 5263 - Week 16 - Thursday, 28 November 1991
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publicising these issues, and being sympathetic towards them. Looking around the room, there are very few of us here who are first generation migrants. I think I might be the only one. But many of you are second and third generation migrants, and we all recognise that the countries that we have come from, or been involved with, have had their troubles in their time. Here we are in this comfortable, peaceful city, and it behoves us to recognise the tremendous problems that exist elsewhere in the world. So, I strongly support the five parts of Mr Collaery's motion, and I hope that we will all do that.
MR BERRY (Minister for Health and Minister for Sport) (3.46): I rise to give the Government's wholehearted support to this honourable motion. I was pleased to have discussed the issue with Mr Collaery before he brought it forward. I must say that, when we watch our televisions, we cannot help being moved by the obscenity of the events which are occurring in Yugoslavia in the course of that war. It is a war which is the same as all other wars. It violates human beings, and it scars human beings for life. Any efforts which can result in some sort of peaceful settlement have to be applauded.
In relation to East Timor, we may never know the full facts about events there, because of the censorship which exists in that very small country. Many Australians have a soft spot for that country, but we really have to focus our attention on the need for the establishment of world peace. Peace is a lofty aim, and the aggressive pursuit of this aim is to be applauded wholeheartedly.
Just to touch on Aidex, because it has brought the pursuit of peace to our front door, those at the Aidex exhibition who have devoted themselves to this lofty cause, without provoking violence, I should say, have to be applauded wholeheartedly, and may they continue to pursue the cause of peace until it is achieved. May I also say that, without the sorts of hardware which are marketed through bazaars such as Aidex, those wars which are occurring abroad would not occur; human beings would not be violated and scarred; neither would those atrocities which were committed against the people of East Timor take place.
So, it is up to us, as representatives of the people of the Australian Capital Territory, to put our shoulder to the wheel in pursuit of peace and, of course, to urge our Federal leaders to put their weight behind any moves which can achieve a lengthy peace for all of those countries which are troubled by the atrocities of war.
MS MAHER (3.49): I would like to move an amendment to Mr Collaery's motion. I move:
Paragraph 5, line 2, after "the", insert "Prime Minister and".
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