TONY EASTLEY: Aboriginal traditional owners say they want the big Jabiluka uranium deposit in the Northern Territory to remain in the ground. They also want it incorporated into the world heritage listed Kakadu National Park.

Michael Coggan reports from Darwin.

(Sound of Midnight Oil performing)

MICHAEL COGGAN: In the late 1990s Australian rock band Midnight Oil joined thousands of Australians in protesting against plans to mine uranium at Jabiluka on a lease inside the world heritage listed Kakadu National Park.

MICHAEL COGGAN: Mining company Energy Resources of Australia erected fences to keep the protesters out of the mine site.

But some of the band members and traditional owner Yvonne Margarula walked into Jabiluka and demanded an end to uranium mining there.

YVONNE MARGARULA: We still say no. Maybe that's all I can say. No to uranium.

(Applause and cheering)

MICHAEL COGGAN: While ERA won a fight for the right to mine the world's largest known undeveloped uranium deposit at Jabiluka the Mirrar Aboriginal traditional owners refused to give the company permission to build the mill it needed to process the uranium at Jabiluka and the mine shaft was filled in.

ERA retains the right to mine the site but now the Mirrar people are declaring a wish to have Jabiluka incorporated into Kakadu National Park.

In an interview with Fairfax newspapers traditional owner Yvonne Margarula says she is quote, "really happy about it becoming part of the national park. My nephews and nieces can look after the country."

It's a sentiment echoed in an interview with the ABC in 2009.

YVONNE MARGARULA (2009): My country is important for me. Caring my country in our care, the country where I grow up. No hunting. And then to the future where the young kids when they grow up.

MICHAEL COGGAN: In an indication of why the Mirrar people want Jabiluka to become a part of Kakadu Ms Margarula this week has written to United Nations secretary general Ban Ki-moon expressing the Mirrar's great sadness at the suffering of the people in Japan from the earthquake, tsunami and the emergency at the Fukushima nuclear power station.

In the letter Ms Margarula says, quote, "This is an industry that we have never supported in the past and that we want no part of into the future.

"Given the long history between Japanese nuclear companies and Australian uranium mines it is likely that the radiation problems at Fukushima are in part at least fuelled by uranium derived from our traditional lands." 

The Mirrar people are foregoing billions of dollars in potential mining royalties. But Yvonne Margarula says money is not as important as looking after their country.

TONY EASTLEY: Michael Coggan.