Hundreds rally in Mparntwe to demand closure of US Pine Gap base.

Written by: Nick G. on 22 July 2026

Led by traditional owners of the land on which the US military base Pine Gap is located, hundreds of anti-war activists have converged on the base and demanded its closure.

In a written statement, traditional owners the Hayes Family welcomed participants in the convergence. They claimed that the family had never given permission for the US to take their land, known as Kuyunba, and that their old people had been lied to and told that it would be a space research facility.

Instead, it is run by the CIA, spies on people’s communications and is used for targeting opponents of the US and Israel for attack by drones and missiles.

“We don’t want to be feeling guilty all the time,” said the Family’s statement, “when bad things are happening overseas to families – women, children, the old people and their homes. We’re not the ones controlling the facility, but we feel guilty that it’s coming from our lands.”

The Family demanded that Pine Gap be “shut down for good,” and that compensation be paid for the seizure of their land “so that we can get houses for White Gate community.”

(Hayes Family members call for the return of their stolen land.)

White Gate community (also known as Irrkerlantye), sits about 5 kilometres from Alice Springs/Mparntwe yet it has to have water trucked in and power is provided by a small set of solar panels. There is no sewerage.

In 2022, far right quisling Jacinta Nampijinpa Price told the National Press Club that colonialism had been positive for First Peoples. “Absolutely. I mean, now we’ve got running water, we’ve got readily available food,” she said.

Yet she would have known that it was her mother, Bess Price, when she was NT Community Services minister in August 2014, who cut off water from the town camp of Ingerreke/ Irrkerlantye/White Gate, leading to protests by town camp residents against Bess Price in September 2014.

Greens senator Lidia Thorpe who met with the Hayes family over the weekend, said "This military and intelligence base, which is aiding and abetting the genocide in Gaza, enjoys security of tenure on stolen land, while the Hayes family are still fighting for secure housing, running water and essential services where they now live at Irrkerlantye." 

Around 500 people participated in the convergence, effectively closing the base for four days as protests took place at its gates.

In Sydney, a solidarity rally with the Mparntwe protests was held outside the US consulate last Monday.

Further protests will take place later this week outside the ALP National Conference in Adelaide as the Independent and Peaceful Australia Network (IPAN) gathers to hold its own national conference under the theme that it’s “Time to Break Free from the US”.

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