Who we are

Sue Coleman-Haseldine

A Kokatha woman who lives in Ceduna in South Australia, Sue Coleman-Haseldine is a nuclear test survivor and outspoken advocate of Aboriginal culture and environmental protection. She was a child at Koonibba Mission when the British carried out nuclear testing at Emu Field and Maralinga in the 1950s and 60s. In 2014, she travelled overseas for the first time to tell 150 governments about the effects of nuclear testing on Aboriginal land, culture and people at the Vienna Conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons.

Sue is a Co-President of the Australian Nuclear Free Alliance and was awarded the South Australian Premier’s award for excellence in Indigenous leadership in 2007 and the 2018 Jill Hudson Award for environmental protection.

Sue participated in a national speaking tour, ‘Black Mist White Rain’, highlighting the humanitarian impacts of nuclear testing, in April 2016. She delivered a statement during the UN nuclear weapons ban treaty negotiating conference at the United Nations in March 2017 and attended the Nobel Peace Prize award ceremony for ICAN in Oslo in December that year.

Karina Lester

Karina Lester is a Yankunytjatjara-Anangu woman who grew up on the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara Lands (APY Lands) in South Australia. Her father, the late Yankunytjatjara elder Yami Lester, was blinded by the ‘black mist’ fallout from the Totem 1 nuclear test at Emu Field in 1953.

The Lester family has been a stalwart of nuclear resistance for decades. Karina works with the University of Adelaide’s Mobile Language Team as the Aboriginal Co-Manager and Language Worker, co-hosting the Nganampa Wangka radio show on Radio Adelaide about South Australian Aboriginal languages.

Karina attended the 2015 World Nuclear Victims Forum in Hiroshima, Japan and spoke about the consequences of British nuclear testing on her family and Aboriginal people more broadly. Along with her sister, Kunmanara Lester, she travelled with the national Black Mist White Rain speaking tour in April 2016, highlighting the humanitarian impacts of nuclear testing in Australia and the Pacific.

Karina and Kunmanara spoke at the women’s marches to “ban the bomb” in New York and Sydney, respectively, in June 2017. Karina delivered an Indigenous statement to the negotiating conference for the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons on behalf of 35 First Nations organisations. The statement helped to enshrine the rights of victims and impacted environments in the final agreement, as well as recognising the disproportionate impacts of nuclear weapon activities on Indigenous people worldwide.

Scott Ludlam

Scott Ludlam is a writer, activist and former Australian Senator representing the Australian Greens.  He served in Parliament from 2008 – 2017, and as Co-Deputy Leader of his party from 2015 – 2017. Scott held the nuclear issues portfolio for nine years, during which time he contributed to campaigns on uranium mining, waste dumping and nuclear weapons. He is currently an occasional columnist for The Guardian and The Monthly, and his first book on ecology, technology and politics will be published in 2020.

He is a long-term supporter of ICAN, co-hosting the Western Australian launch in 2007 and travelling to New York in 2017 for the final session of the ban treaty negotiations. He delivered a statement to the negotiating conference on the day before the Treaty’s adoption.

Robert Tickner AO

Robert has been campaigning against nuclear weapons since he was in his early 20s, firstly as an activist in the environmental movement and then as a Federal Labor MP where he was the convenor of Labor Parliamentarians for a nuclear-free Australia. 

Robert was Australia’s longest serving Minister for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs, before spending a decade as the CEO of Australian Red Cross. During that time he spoke on behalf of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Federation at the three international humanitarian conferences in Norway, Mexico and Austria, which led to the negotiation of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. 

Robert is a patron of the Tom Uren Memorial Fund and advocates tirelessly for Australia to sign and ratify the Treaty.

Maxine Goodwin

In 1952, at the age of twenty, Maxine’s father, a radio technician with the Royal Australian Air Force, was deployed to Onslow, Western Australia, in preparation for Operation Hurricane—the first British atomic test conducted in Australia. His unit was tasked with coastal monitoring along the west Australian coastline. The day after detonation, two Dakota aircraft flew from Onslow to Broome to search for radioactivity along coast. During the return flight, intense radioactivity was detected at 10,000 feet. Maxine’s father was responsible for servicing the Dakota aircraft and later told his family that he had been onboard one of the planes that “flew through the cloud.”

Maxine’s father fell ill when she was a child and passed away at the age of 49 from lymphoma. For years, Maxine has dedicated herself to researching her father’s story. To deepen her understanding and amplify the voices of nuclear test veterans and their families, she has participated in community arts projects. This includes providing testimony for academic and creative producer Paul Brown’s verbatim play, Half a Life, and contributing to the Nuclear Futures project.

In 2023, Maxine joined the ICAN delegation to Canberra, where she met with government decision-makers to discuss the experiences of survivors of the British nuclear testing program in Australia. She called on the Australian government to acknowledge and address the harms caused by nuclear weapons testing and urged the Prime Minister to sign the TPNW.

Melissa Parke

Melissa Parke is a former Federal Labor member for Fremantle, former Minister for International Development and former United Nations lawyer. She has degrees in business, law and public international (human rights) law. Melissa is a patron of the Tom Uren Memorial Fund, which supports the work of ICAN Australia. She is currently the Executive Director of ICAN International.

Vale Kunmanara Lester

Kunmanara Lester was an ICAN Ambassador, along with her sister Karina Lester, until her passing in June 2021. Kunmanara worked as a translator and interpreter, with a passion for preserving and sharing traditional language.

Dr Margaret Beavis (Co-Chair)

Margie Beavis is a former general practitioner with a strong interest in public health. She teaches at Melbourne University and is the immediate past president of the Medical Association for Prevention of War. She is convenor of Quit Nukes, a joint campaign of ICAN Australia and MAPW, working with Australian superannuation funds to be nuclear weapons-free.

Associate Professor Marianne Hanson (Co-Chair)

Associate Professor Marianne Hanson gained her Masters and Doctoral degrees in International Relations at Oxford University, where she focused on international security issues, especially the East-West conflict, strategic studies, and arms control. She has lectured at the University of Queensland for the past 24 years; prior to this appointment, she was a Stipendiary Lecturer at Magdalen College, Oxford University. Between 2000 and 2005, she served on the Australian government’s advisory panel on international security.

Dr Hanson joined the ICAN Australia board in 2019.

Victoria May (Secretary)

Victoria is a digital fundraising specialist who joined the ICAN Australia board in 2022, after acting as a board observer as a participant in The Observership Program throughout 2021. Victoria has a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Melbourne, a Master of Arts from RMIT and a Master of Business from the Australian Centre for Philanthropy and Nonprofit Studies at QUT.

Dr Marcus Yip (Treasurer)

Marcus is Emergency Physician in Melbourne, Victoria. He also has a Bachelor of Biomedical Science with Honours and has previously served as Student Representative for the Medical Association for Prevention of War.

Dimity Hawkins AM

Dimity has over three decades of experience in the civil society sector working as an advocate on issues of nuclear disarmament and broader social, environmental and human rights activism. She was a co-founder of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear weapons (ICAN). Dimity is completing her PhD through Swinburne University in Melbourne focussed on nuclear weapons testing in the Pacific. She is also a co-coordinator of the Nuclear Truth Project. Dimity was made a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) in the 2019 Queens Birthday Honours for “significant service to the global community as an advocate for nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament.”

Dr Daryl Le Cornu

Daryl teaches history curriculum education at Western Sydney University and lectures in the UN Diploma course for the UNAA. He has had many years’ experience as a high school teacher and is currently a curriculum consultant and textbook writer for history and legal studies courses secondary schools. He is Director of Education at the World Citizens Association of Australia (WCAA).

Dr Tilman Ruff AO

Tilman Ruff is a public health and infectious diseases physician, Hon Principal Fellow at the University of Melbourne, Co-President of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (Nobel Peace Prize 1985) since 2012, a co-founder and founding international and Australian chair of ICAN.

Dave Sweeney

Dave Sweeney has been active in the uranium mining and nuclear debate for over three decades through his work with the media, trade unions and environment groups on mining, resource and Indigenous issues. Dave is a founding member of ICAN and also leads the Australian Conservation Foundation’s national nuclear free campaign.

Talei Luscia Mangioni

Talei Luscia Mangioni is a PhD candidate and Pacific Studies teacher at the School of Culture, History and Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University.

Talei joined the board in 2021.

Dr Ruth Mitchell

Ruth Mitchell is a neurosurgeon at Sydney Children’s Hospital and Prince of Wales Hospital, Randwick, NSW. She is currently Chair of the Board of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW). She also chairs the board of the Ubuntu Lab, an emerging museum of the humanities. Recently awarded the 2022 Convocation Medal by her alma mater, Flinders University, for her work with ICAN, she was also the 2019 winner of the John Corboy Medal from the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons for her advocacy for diversity and inclusion in surgery, and was the inaugural Australian Medical Association Doctor in Training of the Year in 2016. She has previously served as Co-Chair of the ICAN Australia Board, and Vice President of the Medical Association for the Prevention of War. Twitter/Instagram @drruthmitchell.

Tara Gutman

Tara Gutman is a lawyer and strategist specialised in international law at Lexbridge Lawyers. She has spearheaded initiatives that have shaped government policies to advance legal and humanitarian causes.

She spent 10 years at Australian Red Cross, where, as Legal Advisor in the Humanitarian Law (IHL) Department, she led major international initiatives including supporting the entry into force and universalisation of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW). She was a member of the International Red Cross Red Crescent Nuclear Weapons Core Group and devised numerous campaigns and advocacy strategies to promote the TPNW for the Red Cross Red Crescent Movement. As National Manager of Advocacy and Government Relations, she led the organisation’s engagement with government on crises and natural disasters and continued to advocate for Australia to join the TPNW.

Tara worked in Cambodia supporting the development of a hybrid court to prosecute war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity (2003-2006) and was a Visiting Professional at the International Criminal Court in The Hague. She previously worked in Sydney as an arts and entertainment lawyer. Tara is a Board Member of ICAN Australia and Companion House, assisting survivors of torture and trauma.

Previous board members

ICAN Australia wishes to acknowledge the advice and assistance of previous Board members, from the first meeting in May 2006 to the present day, in alphabetical order:

Richard Broinowski

Joseph Camilleri

Daisy Gardener

Jenny Grounds

John Langmore

Jessica Lawson

Nic Maclellan

Fred Mendelsohn

Marie McInerney

Kazuyo Preston

Catriona Standfield

Richard Tanter

Sue Wareham OAM

Bill Williams

Tim Wright

Mark Zirnsak

Gem Romuld, Director

Gem Romuld is the Australian Director for the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, building awareness and pressure for Australia to sign and ratify the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. She has degrees in Communications and Law from the University of Technology, Sydney. Gem has been a multi-disciplinary campaigner for over a decade, and is dedicated to growing our collective power to build a better world. She is based on Dharawal land in Wollongong.

Email: gem@icanw.org

Jemila Rushton, Campaigner

Jemila has been working with ICAN Australia since 2019. With a background as an organiser, networker and community builder, Jemila has been working to address the interlinkages of militarism, extractivism, and colonialism for over a decade. Jemila Represented ICAN Australia at the First Meeting of States Parties to the TPNW in Vienna in June 2023.

Jemila holds a Bachelor of Arts in International Community Development from Victoria University, Naarm/Melbourne, and is based on the lands of the Peek Whurrong speaking people on the shores of Gunditjmara Southern Ocean sea country in Victoria.

Email: jemila@icanw.org

Tim Wright, Treaty Coordinator

Tim Wright is ICAN’s Treaty Coordinator. He is a member of the ICAN international staff team, overseeing work to promote universal adherence to the 2017 Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. He has been involved in the campaign since it began in 2006. He has degrees in law and arts from the University of Melbourne.

Email: tim@icanw.org

Jesse Boylan, Media and Communications Adviser

Jesse Boylan joined ICAN Australia as their Media and Communications Adviser in 2023. Jesse works across photography, filmmaking, art, radio, and journalism to engage with anti-nuclear, climate, and mining issues in Australia and internationally. Jesse is a PhD candidate at RMIT University in the School of Art, and is based on Dja Dja Wurrung Country in Central Victoria.

Email: jesse@icanw.org

Leila Mutapcic, Bookkeeper/Administration

War survivor. Passionate about eliminating the use of nuclear weapons and bringing peace and stability to the world. Leila has worked with ICAN Australia since 2019.

Email: accounts@icanw.org 

Previous staff

ICAN Australia wishes to acknowledge the contributions of our staff and special project workers since the campaign began, in alphabetical order:

Cat Beaton

Kirsten Blair

Teri Calder

Adam Dempsey

Chrys Gardener

Lachlan Good

Dimity Hawkins

Sarojini Krishnapillai

Jessica Morrison

James Norman

Lavanya Pant

Pauline Renkin

Felicity Ruby

Colin Stephens

Dianne Street

Glenn Todd

Mihiri Weerasinghe