At Sydney’s mighty arms convention, weapons are sold as ‘solutions’. No one mentions the people they will target

A model missile on show at the Indo-Pacific International Maritime Exposition in Sydney’s Darling Harbour.
Photograph: Hollie Adams/Reuters

Inside the heavily guarded, aseptically cool halls of the Indo-Pacific International Maritime Exposition, Australia’s defence minister, Richard Marles, describes it as, for some in the room, “a kind of Disneyland … the happiest place on Earth”.

Standing outside, facing barricades and a broad line of armed police, those protesting the very presence of the arms conference in Sydney view it is anything but.