Judge Questions Validity of Indigenous Group’s Mythical Claims, Rejects Pipeline Challenge

The Federal Court of Australia has dismissed an Indigenous challenge against a major gas pipeline to the Timor Sea with Justice Natalie Charlesworth criticising the quality of evidence presented by witnesses and environmentalists. Justice Charlesworth said the evidence presented by the Environmental Defenders Office (EDO) involved “confection” and the coaching of Indigenous witnesses. “In the present case, I cannot accept that the witness statements contain words actually spoken by the witnesses and recorded verbatim,” she said. She referred, as an example, to the evidence of Pirrawayingi Puruntatameri, a Tiwi Islander “who was said to have been an author of the document (including in his own witness statement) but when shown the document in cross-examination appeared to be unfamiliar with it.”...