THE Federal Labor Government is set to strengthen a ''draconian'' 1952 law that protects the top secret Pine Gap spy base that has been the target of peace protesters.
Labor and Coalition members of the Senate Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade committee have endorsed amendments to the 57-year-old Defence (Special Undertakings) Act to remove any doubt that its severe penalties for espionage or interference apply to the United States and Australia defence facility near Alice Springs.
People who enter or photograph the base without authorisation face imprisonment for up to seven years.
Australian Greens Senator Robert Ludlam dissented from the committee's decision, saying that the move to strengthen the Cold War era legislation was ''a grossly disproportionate response to peaceful protest''.
''This facility was probably used to co-ordinate bombing raids during the illegal war on Iraq,'' he said.
''The Government is now threatening to lock up innocent civilians who seek to peacefully protest at the site.''
The Pine Gap facility serves as a ground station for United States signals intelligence collection satellites and has the ability to relay early warning of ballistic missile launches.
Defence Minister Joel Fitzgibbon has said it was necessary to strengthen the Government's ability to prosecute anyone who broke into the base by establishing it in law as a ''special defence undertaking''.
In February last year, four Christian anti-war protesters who broke into the Pine Gap facility had their convictions quashed.
Jim Dowling, Donna Mulhearn, Adele Goldie and Bryan Law, members of the Christians Against All Terrorism group, used bolt cutters on a high-security fence and entered the technical support area at Pine Gap in December 2005. They were fined more than $3000 and the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions appealed against what it said was the leniency of the sentence, while the defendants appealed against their convictions.
The Northern Territory Court of Criminal Appeal in Darwin subsequently acquitted all four defendants, saying there had been ''a miscarriage of justice'' because they had been denied a possible defence, mainly establishing that the facility was not necessary for defence purposes.
In a submission to the Senate committee, the Defence Department asserted that ''any incursion into Pine Gap could represent a serious threat to national security''.
Mr Dowling told the committee that ''it seems to me that the only purpose in changing the law is to punish and frighten those thinking about engaging in non-violent resistance against Pine Gap's role in war making''.
Peace protesters first targeted the Pine Gap facility in 1976. During the 1980s and 1990s protesters breaking into the facility were routinely charged with the minor offence of trespass.
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