Court date marks eight-year NT nuke fight

The eight-year anniversary of a fight to stop a NT nuclear dump was marked with a court appearance. Source: AAP

FOR Dianne Stokes, it was fitting that the eight-year anniversary of a fight to stop a Northern Territory nuclear dump was marked by a brief and frustrating court appearance.

Ms Stokes, an elder with the Yapa Yapa people, is one of the traditional land owners taking action to stop the federal government dump proposal, which is earmarked for Muckaty Station.

She was present on Monday when the Federal Court heard a delay in an anthropologist's report may push back a 2014 trial date.

Ms Stokes says the traditional land owners' complaints to the government had for years fallen on deaf ears.

"It's been a long struggle, many years of struggling to say we didn't want the waste to come to our land when no one is listening," she said outside court in Melbourne.

But she said new Resources Minister Gary Gray had agreed to visit the site and meet

community members - a move she welcomes.

"We're going to try to hassle him until he comes down," Ms Stokes said.

"It's a spiritual country, it's a cultural land and it's a very strong belief we have in that county."

The waste dump was originally planned to be built in South Australia, but in the face of local opposition the federal government sought to relocate it to the NT.

A site at Muckaty Station, about 110km north of Tennant Creek, was flagged as a possible site.

Australian Conservation Foundation spokesman Dave Sweeney said Mr Gray's visit was a step forward in the conflict, but that it signalled a "change in tone, not necessarily a change in policy".

Mr Gray declined to comment.

The parties will return to the Federal Court for another directions hearing in August.

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