Brendan Nelson (Bradfield, Liberal Party, Minister for Defence) Share this | Hansard source

I am not able or prepared to discuss things that involve intelligence and operational things in detail. I know you are not asking for that. The issues that the member for Barton raises are very much the subject of discussion between us, our coalition partners and the Iraqis. A lot of what we will be doing involves mentoring, training and support, and it has been publicly reported that there are elements involved, perhaps even insurgencies, who seem to have infiltrated sections of the Iraqi security forces, particularly the police forces. We are very aware of that. Before we make the final commitment to Operation Overwatch, that and quite a number of other issues will be settled to our satisfaction.

At the risk of sounding flippant, Iraq is a war zone and a dangerous place. We have undertaken a very thorough risk assessment in terms of what our ADF personnel may be doing in the next phase in southern Iraq. The next phase is going to be very dangerous for some of the reasons which the member for Barton raises and, indeed, for a lot of others, but it is the next very important phase in the campaign in the sense that provinces in southern Iraq, in Al Muthanna in particular, will be moving to provincial Iraqi control with their own government, security forces and so on. I can only say by way of reassurance that that is one of the priority issues which we are actively discussing at the moment and, whilst we are in principle disposed to redeploying to this particular role known as Operation Overwatch, we will not do so until we are satisfied that the risks have been managed to our satisfaction.

See this speech in context