This file contains articles on:
* Senate resolution opposing national radioactive waste dump
* Award of the Goldman Prize to Mrs. Eileen Brown and Mrs. Eileen Wingfield from the Kupa Piti Kungka Tjuta
* Award of the Order of Australia to Mrs Eileen Brown
* at the end of this file, articles on the federal government's racist divide-and-rule tactic to buy off opposition to the dump (which failed)

For more info on the Kupa Piti Kungka Tjuta and their campaign against the dump, visit:
<www.iratiwanti.org>

That the Senate

a) notes that:

1) Eileen Kampakuta Brown, senior Yankunytjatjara/Antikarinya  woman and member of the Kupa Piti Kungka Tjuta from Coober Pedy, was awarded an Order of Australia (AO) for services to the community 'through the preservation, revival and teaching of traditional Anangu (Aboriginal) culture and as an advocate for Indigenous communities in central Australia'.

2) Mrs Brown's extensive traditional cultural knowledge has compelled her to lead a 10-year struggle against the Federal Government's proposal to dump radioactive waste in the South Australian desert.

3) Just days before Mrs Brown was awarded the AO, the Federal Government released its final environmental impact statement for the waste dump project, and

4) The Government also announced that $300 000 is to be spent to 're-educate' the South Australian public and to nullify opposition to the dump; and

b) points out to the Prime Minister the hypocrisy of the Government in giving an award for services to the community to Mrs Brown but taking no notive of her objection, and that of the Yankunytjatjara/Antikarinya community, to its decision to construct a national repository on this land.

Fifty years after they witnessed and survived the British atomic tests in outback South Australia, two Elders from the Kupa Piti Kungka Tjuta have been awarded the 2003 Goldman Environmental Prize for their continuing efforts to protect their country and culture from nuclear contamination.

Mrs Eileen Kampakuta Brown, a Yankunytjatjara/Antikarinya Elder from Coober Pedy, and Mrs Eileen Wani Wingfield, a Kokatha Elder now residing in Port Augusta, are members of the Kupa Piti Kungka Tjuta - a council of Senior Women based in Coober Pedy. Since the council formed in the mid 90's the Kungkas have spearheaded a national environmental campaign in opposition to the national radioactive waste dump proposed for their country.

"We say NO Radioactive waste dump in our ngura - in our country!"

Their inspiring campaign is called Irati Wanti, 'The poison, Leave it'. To the Kungka Tjuta their country is not a remote wasteland suitable for the dumping of highly dangerous nuclear waste: "Never mind our country is the desert," explain the Kungka Tjuta, "That's where we belong." The Kungka Tjuta follow their Tjukur, their Dreaming/Law. The Tjukur tells the story of the Seven Sisters who travelled across the country, creating it. Similarly, the Kungka Tjuta have travelled tirelessly across the continent to protect and care for their ngura, their country. "Don't waste our country. Don't waste our future."

 Mrs Brown and Mrs Wingfield are pivotal members of the Kungka Tjuta. Mrs Brown is a renowned advocate and teacher; widely recognised for her extensive traditional cultural knowledge. Mrs Brown looks after her traditional country, her family and her community. Mrs Wingfield is well respected among her community for her ability to talk clearly and strongly about contemporary political issues effecting Kokatha people and country.

From San Francisco to Sydney - Two award ceremonies on April 15th

San Francisco -- Both Senior Women were invited by the Goldman Foundation to visit the USA to collect their prize. Mrs Wingfield, along with her daughter Rebecca Bear-Wingfield, flew over to the States last week to meet up with the other five prizewinners from around the world. The group participate in a 10 day tour of San Fran and Washington DC for the award ceremony, news conferences and meetings with political and environmental leaders. This is Mrs Wingfield's first ever trip overseas and despite failing health, and family and cultural responsibilities she has undertaken this massive journey, attesting to her courage and resolve to protect Kokatha country for future generations.

Sydney -- Due to health reasons Mrs Brown couldn't travel overseas, instead opting for a ceremony in Sydney to coincide with the official prize ceremony in San Francisco. Key members of the KPKT - Mrs Emily Munyungka Austin, Mrs Eileen Unkari Crombie and Mrs Martha Edwards have accompanied Mrs Brown on the epic 2600km journey to Sydney - down the same highway the radioactive waste would be transported if a dump were built in SA.

The award ceremony is to be held at the Sydney Observatory at 10am this morning and will attended by Local Indigenous Elders, media, politicians, family, friends and supporters of the Kungka Tjuta, including Christine Anu who will be presenting Mrs Brown with her award.

Goldman Prize Background

The Goldman Environmental Prize is given annually to grassroots environmental heroes from six geographical areas. As the largest award of its kind, the Goldman Prize has been dubbed the 'Nobel Prize for the Environment'. The winners are selected by an international jury from confidential nominations. The Goldman Prize allows individuals to continue winning environmental victories against the odds and inspire ordinary people to take extraordinary actions to protect the world.

Only four Australians have previously won the Prize. Greens Senator Bob Brown was awarded the Prize in 1990 for his work protecting Tasmania's Franklin River Wilderness. John Sinclair followed in 1993 for his efforts to protect QLD's Fraser Island and Yvonne Margarula and Jacqui Katona shared the Prize in 1999 for leading the Mirrar campaign to stop the Jabiluka Uranium Mine in Kakadu National Park. Being recognised among such prestigious Australians; Mrs Brown, Mrs Wingfield and the Kungka Tjuta gain the national and international acclaim that they deserve. In addition, recognition of the Irati Wanti campaign and the Kungka Tjuta's fight for culture and country is a testament to the importance of these issues in the political, environmental and cultural arenas of the world.

Congratulations to Mrs Eileen Kampakuta Brown, Mrs Eileen Wani Wingfield and all the Kungkas. The Goldman Prize is a tribute to your courage and dedication to `keep the country clean' for all Australians.

The Goldman Environmental Prize is given annually to grassroots environmental heroes from six geographic areas: Africa, Asia, Europe, Islands and Island Nations, North America, and South and Central America. (Two winners will share the Island Nations award this year.) The Prize includes a no-strings-attached award of $125,000. As the largest award of its kind, the Goldman Environmental Prize has been called the "Nobel Prize for the Environment."

The 2003 Goldman Environmental Prize winners -- Islands and Island Nations:

Eileen Kampakuta Brown and Eileen Wani Wingfield, Australia

Aboriginal elders Eileen Kampakuta Brown and Eileen Wani Wingfield are at the forefront of the campaign to block construction of a nuclear waste dump in their South Australian desert homeland. Since the British nuclear bomb tests of the 1950's, South Australia's traditional Aboriginal homelands have been one of the testing and dumping grounds for the world's nuclear industry, causing asthma attacks, birth defects and cancer as well as poisoning the environment and wildlife. Now, Brown and Wingfield are leading their communities in an international campaign to say "Irati Wanti"—the poison, leave it.

About the Goldman Environmental Prize

The Goldman Environmental Prize allows individuals to continue winning environmental victories against the odds and inspire ordinary people to take extraordinary actions to protect the world. The Goldman Environmental Prize was created in 1990 by civic leaders and philanthropists Richard N. Goldman and his late wife, Rhoda H. Goldman. Richard Goldman founded Goldman Insurance Services in San Francisco. Rhoda Goldman was a descendant of Levi Strauss, the founder of the worldwide clothing company.

The Goldman Environmental Prize winners are selected by an international jury from confidential nominations submitted by a worldwide network of environmental organizations and individuals. Prize winners participate in a 10-day tour of San Francisco and Washington, D.C., for an awards ceremony and presentation, news conferences, media briefings, and meetings with political, public policy, financial and environmental leaders.

AUSTRALIA

Toxic & Nuclear Contamination:

EILEEN KAMPAKUTA BROWN AND EILEEN WANI WINGFIELD

"Our job is to care for the country; doesn't matter who it is, Aboriginal, Non-Aboriginal. We've been caring for it properly and talking about everything. We don't want this, we don't want that to be done, yes we all have to get together and look after this country because we want a clean place to live happy and healthy. We are strong old ladies. We will keep fighting."

Aboriginal elders Eileen Kampakuta Brown and Eileen Wani Wingfield, in their 70s, have survived half a century of government sanctioned nuclear contamination in the South Australian desert—from nuclear weapons tests to one of the world's largest uranium mines. So when the federal government announced plans to bury nuclear waste from Sydney in Australia's wild desert lands, these elders said "Irati Wanti"—the poison, leave it. In 1995, Brown, Wingfield and other elder women formed the Kupa Piti Kungka Tjuta—Cooper Pedy Women's Council—or Kungka Tjuta, to stop the nuclear waste dump and protect their land and culture.

Australia's federal government is proposing a new national radioactive waste dump in the central desert of South Australia near Woomera. The proposed dump would store radioactive waste in a shallow grave the size of a soccer field shipped from a nuclear reactor in Sydney and from its new, multi-million dollar replacement. The facility, located just three kilometers from a weapons testing range, would store the waste for up to three hundred years. In addition to the threat of this dump, it is widely believed that once this dump is built, the area could be tagged for even more dangerous high-level nuclear waste from around the world. The waste dump campaign is being closely watched by the Pangea Group, a US-based consortium that is looking for an Australian site to dump high-level nuclear waste from power plants and nuclear weapons programs around the world.

Brown and Wingfield are most concerned about the risk of nuclear contamination seeping into the groundwater that maintains life in their region of South Australia, the driest state in the country. To the Kungka Tjuta, their homeland is not a remote wasteland suitable for the dumping of highly dangerous nuclear waste. "Never mind our country is the desert," state the Kungka Tjuta. "That's where we belong." Many of the region's water sources are unmapped and unknown by non-Aboriginal Australians, but have sustained Aboriginal people and desert wildlife for thousands of years. The Federal Bureau of Science's own inquiry admits that the proposed design will not prevent leakage into groundwater in all possible climatic conditions.

"We know the poison from the radioactive dump will go down under the ground and leak into the water. We drink from this water. The animals drink from this water. We're worried that the animals will become poisoned, and we'll become poisoned in our turn," explains the Kungka Tjuta's Declaration of Opposition.

The Kungka Tjuta elders have seen the effects of nuclear waste firsthand. Between 1953 and 1963, the British military conducted 12 full-scale nuclear weapons tests in the South Australian desert. The government told Aboriginal communities this testing was completely safe. There are even tragic accounts of Aboriginal families innocently sleeping in highly toxic bomb craters. Without knowing the true danger of the bright light and immense cloud of black and red smoke blanketing the sky, communities were caught in the nuclear fall-out. Brown vividly recalls the day a black radioactive mist filled the desert skies: "The smoke caught us. We tried opening our eyes in the morning, but we couldn't open them. Our eyes were sore, red and shut." Many got violently sick with radiation poisoning; others went blind; many developed cancer and quickly died. Kangaroo, emu and echidna (porcupine) in the area, an important food source for Aboriginal communities, were also poisoned. Brown's nephew was one of those who lost his sight as a child. Birth defects, cancer and asthma are now alarmingly common among Aboriginal communities.

Now, 50 years after the first nuclear bomb detonation in the South Australian desert, Aboriginal communities find themselves in another fight for their lives. Not willing to endure further degradation of their land and a new round of health threats, Brown, Wingfield and the Kungka Tjuta are leading the campaign to stop the waste dump.

Working tirelessly, despite their age and failing health, Brown and Wingfield have brought the Aboriginal peoples' fight against the proposed nuclear dump to the world stage. They have traveled 3,000 kilometers—a three-day bus trip—to protest the dump. They have written government officials, visited Parliament House, brought their message to the Olympic games in Sydney and partnered with the environmental community in Australia's urban centers to organize the successful online IratiWanti.org campaign. Eighty-seven percent of South Australians recently polled oppose construction of the radioactive waste dump.

Despite this opposition, the Australian government is plowing ahead with their plans to build the dump. They are set to spend over a quarter million on a "re-education" public relations campaign to address the "concerns" of South Australians and sway state public opinion. All federal assessments for the radioactive waste dump are complete. The federal government has given clear indication that it will attempt to override South Australia's state laws and continue Australia's shameful legacy of poisoning Aboriginal land and people.

Brown, Wingfield and the Kungka Tjuta elders have their own legacy to fulfill. They will continue to fight the dump site and pass on vital cultural and environmental lessons learned from their grandmothers.

"We're worrying for the country and we're worrying for our kids," wrote the Kungka Tjuta in a letter of opposition to the dump site. "We say NO radioactive waste dump in our ngura—in our country. Don't waste our country. Don't waste our future."

TWO South Australian Aboriginal elders have won a prestigious international prize for their campaign against a proposed radioactive waste dump.

Eileen Kampakuta Brown and Eileen Wani Wingfield will today be presented with the $US125,000 ($A207,097) 2003 Goldman Environmental Prize dubbed the Nobel Prize for the environment.

The Aboriginal elders, both aged in their 70s, were recognised for their active opposition to the national waste dump, which will be located at one of three sites near Woomera in the state's north.

Founder of the prize, US philanthropist Richard N. Goldman, said the winners worked "to inspire their communities to fight for environmental protection".

"In the current political climate, it is more important than ever to recognise people who are working to protect the health of their water, air and community resources," he said.

The women are survivors of the 1950s Maralinga atomic tests which devastated their traditional lands and decimated their communities.

"All the old people died and people had sores everywhere, stomach trouble and everything," said Mrs Wingfield, who lives at Port Augusta.

"A lot of people got sick and a lot of people died and this poison, they're still mucking about with it."

The women were spurred to action in 1995, forming the Kupa Piti Kungka Tjuta, a collective of Aboriginal women opposed to any attempt to bury the nation's radioactive waste in traditional lands.

Mrs Brown, who came from Coober Pedy to Adelaide last week to receive an Order of Australia, said the Goldman Prize strengthened her resolve to fight the dump. "This award makes me feel strong," she said. "Even though I am getting old I will keep going, still talking strong against the Irati ? poison."

Only four Australians have previously won the Goldman Prize, including Greens Senator Bob Brown.

Mrs Wingfield is in San Francisco to receive her prize today and Mrs Brown is in Sydney, where singer Christine Anu will present the award. The Goldman prize is presented annually to six "environmental heroes" ? one from each of the six continental regions.

AWARD of the Goldman Environmental Prize to Aboriginal elders Eileen Kampakuta Brown and Eileen Wani Wingfield for their dogged opposition to the planned radioactive waste dump is recognition and inspiration.

The two women are survivors of the atomic tests at Maralinga in the 1950s. They are also a timely rebuff to the Federal Government's continued message that opposition to the low level dump is synonymous with hysteria and ignorance.

Half a century on, these two women have lived with the lethal impact and the Berlin Wall of denial that followed Maralinga.

Their misgivings are the misgivings of the overwhelming majority of their fellow South Australians.

If only this award would be accompanied by Federal Government acceptance that their dump decision is unfair and unwarranted.

Still talking ... Eileen Kampakuta Brown at Observatory Hill yesterday for the Australian ceremony to award her the Goldman Prize for environmental campaigning. Photo: Robert Pearce Eileen Wani Wingfield, who won the prize jointly with Mrs Brown.

The campaign slogan is "Irati wanti" which roughly translates as "The poison - leave it".

In the case of the Kupa Piti Kungka Tjuta, a council of senior Aboriginal women based around Coober Pedy in South Australia, the poison is nuclear waste.

Yesterday the council's founders, Eileen Kampakuta Brown and Eileen Wani Wingfield, received the Goldman Prize for environmental activism - and $US125,000 ($207,000) - to continue their campaign against waste dumping.

The women, both in their 70s, have spent the past eight years fighting the suggestion that "poison" from Sydney's Lucas Heights nuclear reactor would be dumped on their traditional lands.

"There's a lot of life out there," Mrs Brown said through her granddaughter, Karina Lester, yesterday.

"People are living out there ... It's a no-go area."

Mrs Brown said she was talking on behalf of her ancestors so that her children and grandchildren might also be able to live on the land.

Yesterday, a letter from the federal Environment Minister, David Kemp, and obtained by the Australian Conservation Foundation, revealed that Dr Kemp was concerned about one of the proposed dump sites near Woomera, South Australia, because it was close to a military range.

That would leave only two other sites, also near Woomera, as potential locations for the dump. A decision on the site is due by early May.

But a spokeswoman for Dr Kemp said he had still not decided which site to recommend.

Mrs Brown said she would continue to campaign against the dump site being located in South Australia. "I have been talking," she said. "I am still strong so I will keep talking."

Mrs Brown drove for four days to be in Sydney to collect her award. Her fellow recipient, Mrs Wingfield, travelled to San Francisco for the international ceremony.

The Goldman Prize, the largest of its kind and considered the equivalent of the Nobel Prize for environmental campaigning, is awarded each year to community activists from six geographic areas.

The founder of the prize, Richard Goldman, said the women had been chosen for a campaign that "exemplifies how much can be accomplished when ordinary people take extraordinary action to protect the health of our planet".

"In the current political climate, it is more important than ever to recognise people who are working to protect the health of their water, air and community resources," Mr Goldman said.

It is the fourth time Australians have won the prize. Previous recipients include Greens Senator Bob Brown for his work on the Franklin River campaign.

International recognition, today, of the stance two Aboriginal women have made against the Federal Government's plans to dump and bury radioactive waste serves to further highlight the lack of action by the NSW Government, Greens MLC Ian Cohen said.

Speaking after the awarding of the international Goldman Environmental Prize to Mrs Eileen Kampakuta Brown OAM from Coober Pedy and Mrs Eileen Wani Wingfield from Port Augusta, Mr Cohen said the NSW Premier only had a "narrow window of opportunity left" to properly investigate the problems of nuclear waste transport from the old Lucas Heights reactor.

"A decision by the Federal Government on the storage and transport of nuclear waste is only weeks away and yet the NSW Premier remains silent on his election promise of a parliamentary enquiry," Mr Cohen said.

"The people of NSW are concerned there are little or no safety plans in place to cope with an accident and possible spill along the proposed nuclear waste transport corridor through Sydney streets and out through western NSW and there is no guarantee that a waste dump will not be located in NSW.

"NSW should join South Australia, who has legislated against the Federal Government's plans, and demonstrate its commitment to the health and safety of the people of the state."

A decision by Federal Environment Minister David Kemp on the transportation and disposal of nuclear waste from Lucas Heights is due on May 9.

"The Greens introduced a private members bill in June 2000 to ban the transport of nuclear waste and of locating any nuclear waste dumps in NSW. The Government knew of our concerns but failed to act."

The Coober Pedy Women's Council - or Kungka Tjuta - was formed by Mrs Brown, Mrs Wingfield and other elder women in 1995 to stop a nuclear waste dump and to protect their land and culture.

DIMINUTIVE Eileen Kampakuta Brown stood tall on the steps of Parliament House yesterday. Aged in her 70s, the Aboriginal elder from Coober Pedy proudly showed off a gleaming Order of Australia medal to a round of cheers and applause.

"I am very happy to receive this award," Mrs Brown said through her interpreter, Mona Tur.

Earlier Mrs Brown, on a rare visit to Adelaide, was presented with the medal by Governor Marjorie Jackson-Nelson and then celebrated at a reception hosted by Status of Women Minister Steph Key.

The Yankunytjatjara/Antikarinya woman is an avowed opponent of the Federal Government's plan to build a radioactive waste dump in South Australia's north.

For the past decade Mrs Brown who, as a young woman, witnessed the atomic testing in the Maralinga lands, has campaigned against the dump which has been proposed for one of three sites near Woomera.

In an ironical twist not lost on Mrs Brown, the Federal Government this year recognised her efforts to protect and nurture  indigenous cultures in SA.

She was awarded the order for service to the community "through the preservation, revival and teaching of traditional Anangu culture and as an advocate for indigenous communities in Central Australia".

Mrs Brown is also a senior member of the Kupa Piti Kungka Tjuta, a council of women from Aboriginal communities in the northern lands formed to fight the dump's establishment.

They argue the desert of the state's north is their home - not a place where a radioactive waste dump should be located.

Mrs Brown pledged yesterday to continue the campaign against the dump proposal.

"The land is our spirit and our soul," she said.

"We want our land to be free of poison because they're poisoning our country and land.

"I'm going to be very strong ... I'm going to keep on talking. I don't want the Irati,  the poison, to come." Mrs Brown said.

"I want my generation of children to be free of the uranium.

"When I was a young girl we saw the bomb explode.

"That was enough ... we don't want the other poison."

Federal Environment Minister David Kemp is expected to announce the location of the repository by May 9.

FIFTY years after surviving the "poison" of the Maralinga nuclear tests, a number of senior Aboriginal women are vowing to fight until their last breath against the construction of a radioactive waste dump in the South Australian desert.

"I don't feel tired. I still want to fight," said 70-year-old Emily Munyungka Austin.

The Yankunytjatjara elder is part of the Kupa Piti Kungka Tjuta - a council of Aboriginal women fighting federal government plans to build a radioactive waste repository on their lands in the state's far north.

The Government will make a final decision within weeks on the construction of the facility. This decision will trigger the annulment of native title claims under the Land Acquisition Act.

Many of the original group members have died of cancer since the Kupa Piti Kungka Tjuta began protesting against the dump in 1998. All of them had breathed the "black mist", a dense radioactive cloud that travelled northwest across South Australia after the British government nuclear Totem One test was detonated at Emu Junction in October 1953.

Eileen Kampakuta Brown, a pioneering Yankunytjatjara elder, recalled her family members and friends vomiting and coughing, and suffering blindness and skin irritations as the nuclear cloud passed for a day over Wallatina Station, about 200km northwest of Emu.

She still has the scars. Lifting her orange dress yesterday, Mrs Brown pointed to the white splotches across her limbs. She said the marks appeared all over her body five years after the blast.

"My eyes are no good too," she said. And this drives her to keep fighting. Even though all the other ladies have passed away during the fight, I will keep going - I will keep talking," Mrs Brown said.

"The bomb was the first poison but this dump will be stronger poison - it will kill everything."

Formed in 1994 to "keep the culture going", the Kupa Piti Kungka Tjuta spearheaded a national campaign against the dump called Irati Wanti - "The poison, leave it". The protest helped muster opposition from environmental and political groups across Australia.

Since then, the women have travelled across the country, campaigning tirelessly.

Mrs Brown will collect in Adelaide today an Order of Australia award for service to the community "through the preservation, revival and teaching of traditional Anangu (Aboriginal) culture".

On Australia Day 2003 Eileen Kampakuta Brown, senior Yankunytjatjara/Antikarinya woman and member of the Kupa Piti Kungka Tjuta from Coober Pedy, South Australia, was awarded an Order of Australia. This coincides with the release, late last week, of the final Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for a radioactive waste repository in South Australia, a project that Mrs Brown has vocally opposed for many years.

Mrs Brown's order is for service to the community 'through the preservation, revival and teaching of traditional Anangu (Aboriginal) culture and as an advocate for Indigenous communities in Central Australia'. Mrs Brown's nomination emphasised her seniority amongst Western desert Anangu communities. Her curriculum vitae detailed a sustained commitment to the protection and restoration of sacred sites; involvement in native title claims; and the protection of women's and children's rights. Mrs Brown's referees all commented on her 'caring' nature - she is a generous and energetic woman in her 70s who continues to care for family, people, country and for her Yankunytjatjara / Antikarinya way of life.

Mrs Brown is being duly recognised as a woman of extensive traditional cultural knowledge. It is this very cultural knowledge that has compelled Mrs Brown to lead a ten-year struggle against the federal government's proposal to dump radioactive waste in the South Australian desert. And just days before Mrs Brown became an officially 'honoured Australia' the federal government released the final environmental impact statement for the waste dump project, dismissing the concerns of Mrs Brown and others.

Mrs Brown's roles as teacher and advocate are inseparable. These aspects come together in her pivotal involvement in the Kupa Piti Kungka Tjuta, a council comprising senior women from Kokatha, Antikarinya and Yankunytjatjara countries. The Kungka Tjuta remain resolutely opposed to the 'remote' dumping of radioactive waste through their campaign called Irati Wanti - the poison, leave it. 'Never mind our country is the desert', explain the Kungka Tjuta, 'that's where we belong. … It's from our grandmothers and our grandfathers that we've learned about the land. This learning isn't written on paper as whitefellas' knowledge is. We carry it instead in our heads and we're talking from our hearts.'

To the Kungka Tjuta the desert is not a 'remote' waste-land suitable for the storage of Australia's radioactive refuse. It is their home — intimately known, densely named and overlaid with stories, meanings, and histories. Furthermore, the desert is life-sustaining, supporting diverse plant and animal life through vast underground water sources.

The recent release of the final EIS was accompanied by a federal government announcement of a $300 000 're-eduction' budget to address the 'concerns' of the South Australian public. The waste dump faces overwhelming community opposition in South Australian, and Labor Premier Mike Rann is preparing to legislate against it. According to the federal government's 'communication strategy' increased 'awareness and knowledge' about the radioactive storage facility will nullify opposition. But it is unlikely to stop Mrs Brown, who says 'I've got the knowledge. ... Never mind that I don't speak English… I speak strong.' Mrs Brown will keep on talking at a federal government that 'honours' and then ignores her, 'they don't listen. They got no ears…'

The Kungka Tjuta clearly don't need a 'communication budget' to make their story look good. They are, after all, award-winning teachers, however obdurate a pupil the federal government is proving. They urge all Australians to 'listen to us. … If we take care of this country, it will take care of us'. As the world heads toward large-scale conflict and destruction [in Iraq], their call for reciprocity and respect is timely. Guided by the example of Mrs Brown the Kungka Tjuta all know how important it is to simply 'take care' of their families, their community and their country.

Two Aboriginal groups have refused offers of $90,000 from the federal Government to surrender their native title rights to land earmarked for a radioactive waste dump in South Australia.

The Government is offering a one-off payment to the Kokatha, Kuyani and Barngala communities, which have lodged native title claims over land that includes three desert sites short-listed for a proposed low-level nuclear waste dump.

Science Minister Peter McGauran wants the dump built at Site 52a, inside the Woomera Prohibited Area, about 500km north of Adelaide.

The Kokatha and Barngala people have refused the offer.

"Our heritage is not for sale," Kokatha Land Council representative Andrew Starkey said yesterday.

He said the group was investigating legal avenues to stop the commonwealth from compulsorily acquiring the state land.

Solicitor Philip Teitzel, representing the Barngala people, said they had rejected the $90,000 because many South Australians objected to a radioactive waste dump in their state.

A spokeswoman for Mr McGauran said if agreement were not reached, the commonwealth would consider using its constitutional powers to compulsorily acquire the property interests, including the native title rights.

She said the process would commence under the Lands Acquisition Act following Environment Minister David Kemp’s decision next month on the three sites.

Mr Starkey said the commonwealth had offered the Aboriginal groups $90,000 each to relinquish their native title rights last year.

"The Kokatha said no to the money because it meant signing off our heritage and the cultural rights we have over the area," he said.

"This terrain is where Kokatha would come to hunt game. They would sit in the canegrass and wait for the game, cutting stone tools as they waited."

Kuyani native title consultant John Bannon said the Kokatha veto had made it difficult for the Kuyani to negotiate.

"We believe the Government has acted in good faith, with the aim of coming to an acceptable and practical outcome."

Three native title claimants for the parcel of land set aside for a low-level radioactive waste dump in South Australia were offered $90,000 each last year by the Commonwealth to extinguish native title rights.

At a series of meetings from September last year, a Commonwealth delegation, including representatives of the Department of the Attorney-General, the Department of Finance and the Department of Education and Science and Training, met at a Port Augusta motel to offer money in return for native title.

A spokeswoman for Science Minister Peter McGauran said yesterday the offer was made in relation to the 2.25-square-kilometre area of land on which the repository would be built.

"The offer was made because the Federal Government obviously wanted secure tenure over the land," she said.

"The insult of it, it was just so insulting," said Roger Thomas, spokesman for the Kokatha, one of the native title claimants. "I told the Commonwealth officers to stop being so disrespectful and rude to us by offering us $90,000 to pay out our country and our culture."

Adelaide lawyer Richard Eckerman, who witnessed the offer, said the Government was clear about what they were asking. "What they wanted was absolute certainty in relation to this," Mr Eckerman said. "They wanted to acquire native title rights, they wanted them extinguished by agreement."

Another Kokatha spokesman, Andrew Starkey, said yesterday that the offer had caused anxiety and tension among the claimant groups, the Kokatha, the Bangarla and the Kuyani.

"It was just shameful," he said. "They were wanting people to sign off their cultural heritage rights for a minuscule amount of money. We would not do that for any amount of money."

Instead, the claimants were seeking legal advice this week on whether they could block the Federal Government in the courts. Having failed to extinguish native title, the Government will compulsorily acquire the land, circumventing the Native Title Act.

Bill Clifton, an executive of the Andamooka Land Council and a custodian of section 40A on which the repository will be built, said the area was handed to his sons to look after.

"Looking after it means to say nobody goes touching things and digging up the area," said Mr Clifton.

He said the site, on Arcoona Station, which was an SA Crown lease, was significant, with spiritual trails or dreaming trails passing through the area. He said the pastoral lease was not a problem as Kokatha custodians were able to go onto the land.

"The land is not used in the traditional sense but we look after things and we go there, have a look around and camp there," he said. "We've got a lot of young people who are learning as well."

Also of concern was the potential damage to Aboriginal land by the transport routes that would be built for nuclear waste to be transported in from Darwin, Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne.

Mr McGauran's spokeswoman, Gemma Allman, said the Government had earlier rejected other suitable nuclear dump sites because of their Aboriginal significance.