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Comment by wombatmobile | Hacker News Reader

Now is nothing special. Australia commenced a two-year term as a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council on On 1 January 2013.

Australia–East Timor spying scandal

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia-East_Timor_spying_sc...

Then on 16 October 2017, in New York, the United Nations General Assembly elected Australia to serve on the Human Rights Council (HRC) for the 2018-20 term.

Witness K and the 'outrageous' spy scandal that failed to shame Australia

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/aug/10/witne...

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To be frank, that spy scandal is not in the same genre of the other abuses that are being discussed by OP/GP and others.

And it looks like the treaty was renegotiated (Australia was shamed) so I’m not sure why you dug this example up

> In 2018, the parties signed a new agreement which gave 80% of the profits to East Timor and 20% to Australia.

> To be frank, that spy scandal is not in the same genre of the other abuses that are being discussed by OP/GP and others.

I don't mind if you are frank, sushicalculus, in fact I welcome it, so long as you are informed.

In the case of East Timor, you should know that Australia was happy to stand by while Indonesia treated the East Timorese similarly to how China treats the Uyghyrs. Australia only acted after the United States lead, and then did its best to weaken the fledgling East Timor government by cheating it out of oil rights.

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/postcolonial-blog...

On the subject of Australian complicity "in the same genre of the other abuses that are being discussed by OP/GP and others", do you know what is happening in West Papua?

https://www.greenleft.org.au/content/west-papua-end-australi...

So bugging a political opponent's room is comparable to exterminating an entire ethnic group?

> So bugging a political opponent's room is comparable to exterminating an entire ethnic group?

That's your association, not mine.

I posted to illustrate that membership of a UN council doesn't require ethics or morality.

The consequences of spying on East Timor to gain an advantage in negotiations over oil reserves were that new nation's only source of foreign revenue was severely compromised. East Timorese lived in poverty and the new government was weakened. Is that so different from what bothers you about the plight of the Uyghurs?

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