Australia should ‘end servility to US’ and have independent China policy, ex-Greek minister says

Former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis, who holds an Australian passport, said at the National Press Club in Canberra on Wednesday that a diplomatic approach would be a “far better way” of addressing Beijing’s “authoritarianism towards its own people” than buying nuclear-powered submarines, which would only force “China’s political class to close ranks around an authoritarian core”.

This has raised questions over Washington’s ability to fulfil its commitment to sell Canberra up to five of the nuclear-powered vessels starting in the 2030s.

The US’ latest announcement was anticipated by Aukus critics, such as eminent Australian defence expert Hugh White, who have argued that Australia not only does not need these kinds of submarines, it was doubtful Washington would be able to deliver them.

On Wednesday, former Australian leader Malcolm Turnbull told local media that the US was not going to sacrifice its own defence needs to meet Australia’s. “The Americans are not going to make their submarine deficit worse than it is already, by giving or selling submarines to Australia,” he said.

In Canberra on the same day, a senate inquiry was underway questioning new legislation that would allow nuclear waste from the Aukus submarines to be dumped across the country.

Using weapons like submarines to counter Beijing’s incursions in the South China Sea was not the solution, said Varoufakis.

Existing world events proved that, he said, citing the example of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

“After successive pledges that there would be no expansion of Nato … which were completely and utterly violated by the West, does that justify Putin’s weaponisation of this particular violation of pledges to invade Ukraine? I don’t think so,” he said.

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