Leftist groups have long campaigned against the Pine Gap intelligence gathering facility, built near Alice Springs more than 40 years ago.
Successive federal governments have resisted calls to release more information about the facility, which is operated jointly by Australia and the United States.
Now, there are new concerns that it might be being used in US drone attacks - and Australia could be not only involved, but also partly liable for the consequences.
As Greg Dyett reports, former Liberal Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser is among those calling for the United Nations to probe the matter.
Australian governments have repeatedly said the Pine Gap facility contributes to the national security of both Australia and the US by providing information on terrorism, and military matters.
They've argued that the very nature of the information gathered makes it impossible to publicly release much information about what Pine Gap actually does.
A former senior foreign affairs official and now the defence correspondent for the Canberra Times, Philip Dorling, has prompted new concerns.
He's quoted former Pine Gap personnel as saying it has played a key role in the use of drones for targetted killing of al-Qaeda and Taliban militants.
Former Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser is among those supporting calls for Australia to be included in a United Nations investigation into the deaths of civilians in drone strikes.
And he says it's the role of Pine Gap that comes into question.
"On published information, it is almost inconceivable that Pine Gap is not used for the purposes that Philip Dorling suggested. He didn't suggest he said they are used. And if it is used in that way, then to what extent does that bind us to the United States?"
The US drone program is said to have killed more than two-thousand al-Qaeda and Taliban militants in more than 370 attacks in Pakistan since 2004.
It's a program which has the support of an overwhelmingly majority of Americans.
A poll taken by the Washington Post and America's ABC News found 83 per cent of Americans approve of President Obama's drone program.
In Pakistan, it's anything but popular with a growing toll of civilian casualties one of the triggers for a United Nations investigation.
The UN Special Rapporteur on Counter Terrorism Ben Emmerson is investigating the civilian impact and human rights implications of the use of drones and other forms of targetted killing for the purpose of counter-terrorism and counter-insurgency.
Now, following Philip Dorling's report in the Fairfax media, he's being asked to investigate Australia's role.
The Australian branch of Human Rights Watch and the Human Rights Law Centre in Melbourne have written a joint letter calling on Ben Emmerson to widen his inquiry to include the Pine Gap allegations.
Emily Howie is the Director of Advocacy and Research at the Human Rights Law Centre.
"Well we've asked the UN to investigate Australia's role in the US drone strikes because we think there's a real risk that Australia could be complicit in any violation of international law that may occur in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia and elsewhere where the drone program is being conducted. Thousands of people have been killed and these are really serious allegations and we would expect to see Australia as a member of the United Nations to participate fully and frankly with the special rapporteur."
Malcolm Fraser says he supports such calls and says government should be as open as possible.
It's a long-held belief which he says saw him become the first Australian Prime Minister to introduce Freedom of Information laws into the federal parliament.
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"Freedom of Information is enormously important and, at the end of the day, it is the only guarantor of liberty because whatever procedures you establish, whatever fine principles you espouse saying look we can't make mistakes because we follow these procedures, you have the undisputed fact that it's all done in the dark, it is done in secret."
The Pine Gap allegations have prompted a warning from Pakistani lawyer Shahzad Akbar who represents more than 150 victims of drone strikes.
He says Australia could be brought before the International Criminal Court for complicity in war crimes.
Malcolm Fraser says Australia needs to take heed of these warnings.
"If there are an undue number of civilians killed it becomes a war crime, so at one end of the spectrum Australians operating out of Australia could be committing war crimes and International Criminal Court, it's a possibility, there are other people much better qualified to make that judgment than I but, certainly, undue civilian deaths are today regarded as a war crime."
As Malcolm Fraser sees it, the rules which govern the secretive US drone program are far too loose.
"Somebody says this is a bad person, he deserves to be killed, we can't capture him for this reason or that reason, so he must be killed, he represents an imminent threat, who defines imminent? The Justice Department in the United States has written a 16 page legal memorandum trying to put a legal framework around that Congressional resolution but it doesn't try to define the word imminent, it says a high level United States official can make the decision, whether you're targeted or I'm targeted, now what is a high level United States official, what responsibility does he or she have, it is all vague, it is all done in secret, it is done in the dark."
A former US counter-terrorism official Matthew Waxman sees it quite differently telling CNN America's drone program is tightly-controlled.
"I think the idea that the United States military and other parts of the United States government are not taking seriously their obligations to comply with the laws of war, they are not taking seriously the idea that collateral damage or mistakes, not only carries immense moral dangers but also strategic dangers I think that's just simply wrong from what I've seen."
Malcolm Fraser says he supports the ANZUS defence treaty that links Australia with the United States and New Zealand.
But he says the concerns over Pine Gap underline what he sees is a need for Australia to reconsider its relationship with the U-S so that Australian sovereignty is not compromised.
"To what extent does Pine Gap guide us, to what extent does it pre-commit us to supporting the United States? We can't say really since it's an information gathering station Americans you can use this for broad strategic information but you can't use it for drone killings, we have no power over that, those decisions are made in the United States and so what it boils down to is it's just one of the factors that makes it paramount that Australia examine the totality of the relationship with the United States. I'm in favour of keeping ANZUS but I'm not in favour of such a derogation of Australian sovereignty that we give the United States Congress the power to take us to war anywhere."
