Stephen Smith (Perth, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The government is committed to providing regular reports and updates on Afghanistan, including to the parliament.

I will update the parliament generally on Afghanistan following my attendance with the Prime Minister at the NATO/International Security Assistance Force, or ISAF, Leaders' Summit in Chicago at the end of this month. The summit follows on from the recent meeting in Brussels of NATO/ISAF foreign and defence ministers which I attended together with Foreign Minister Carr.

Today, I update the House on a range of issues relating to Australia's detainee management in Afghanistan, in keeping with my commitment to provide regular reports to the Australian people on detainee management and to be open and transparent on these matters.

In line with the commitment to transparency, since I announced Australia's detainee management framework in Afghanistan in December 2010, I have provided regular updates including three specific updates in February, October and November last year and six separate statements to parliament on Afghanistan in March, May, July, October and November of last year and February of this year, which included reference to detainee management.

This update also follows my announcement on 1 February this year and my subsequent statement to parliament on 9 February outlining that the Australian Defence Force had deployed a highly trained team of interrogators to Afghanistan, and that interrogation operations had commenced.

Governance

In developing our detainee management framework, we have worked to ensure it is robust and reflects best international practice and governance arrangements.

Australia's detainee management framework is underpinned by the deployment of professional ADF personnel trained in the laws of armed conflict and appropriate detainee handling, rigorous recording and reporting requirements, and the high priority Australia places on addressing all allegations of mistreatment reported to Australian officials, including ADF members.

After capture, detainees are held at a purpose-built screening facility—the Initial Screening Area, or the ISA as it is known—at the Multi-National Base Tarin Kowt in Oruzgan province.

I again visited the Initial Screening Area, the ISA, during my April visit to Oruzgan province. I was again briefed by staff from the Detainee Management Team and the interrogation unit. That brief, of course, for the first time. They are making an important contribution to our mission in Afghanistan.

Again the opportunity was given to show accompanying Australian media this facility, again reflecting our commitment to transparency in respect of these matters.

Detainee management is complex, and implementing a strong detainee management framework in Afghanistan requires constant attention.

I continue to receive ongoing and regular advice from the Department of Defence on the implementation of Australia's detainee management framework and any issues that may arise in the course of operations.

This includes being able to respond to changes to ISAF's detention policy, engaging with international and Afghan human rights organisations, learning from past lessons and experience, and working with our Afghan partners towards transition of security responsibility, including detainee management.

To ensure we meet our own Australian high standards and continue to improve our systems, the ADF's detainee management processes in Afghanistan are subject to regular audits.

Since the introduction of Australia's detainee management framework in Afghanistan on 1 August 2010 following the Dutch withdrawal from Oruzgan, two comprehensive audits have been undertaken, with two more audits planned for this year.

The first of the 2012 audits is currently underway.

With the recent introduction of an interrogation capability, future audits will include reviewing the interrogation capability and processes.

These audits are essential to verify that a strong governance framework remains in place and that we are able to address any issues that might arise.

The last detainee management audit undertaken late last year found that all detention activities conducted at the Australian Defence Force ISA facility in Tarin Kowt over the period of the audit were in compliance with Australian policy, and in compliance with Australia's international and domestic legal obligations and requirements of the International Security Assistance Force.

The outcomes of these audits have been and will continue to be shared with relevant Australian government agencies.

Monitoring

As part of our detainee management framework, we monitor all detainees transferred from ADF custody to Afghan or United States custody.

Australia's monitoring regime includes an Interagency Detainee Monitoring Team, the IDMT, which is led by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

The Interagency Detainee Monitoring Team visits each detainee shortly after transfer and approximately every four weeks after the initial visit. We continue to monitor detainees up until sentencing or release. This reflects the practice of our International Security Assistance Force partners.

Between 1 August 2010 and 7 May this year, the monitoring team has conducted 95 monitoring visits. This includes: 48 visits to the National Directorate of Security, or the NDS, facility in Tarin Kowt, the Afghan facility; 14 visits to the Tarin Kowt central prison; and 33 visits to the detention facility in Parwan, currently managed by the United States. These visits are very important: they are an essential mechanism to ensure detainees apprehended by Australian forces are being treated appropriately after they have been transferred into the custody of others. To date, our monitoring of ADF apprehended detainees in Oruzgan and Parwan has not identified serious issues of concern that would warrant consideration of the suspension in transfers.

Number of d etainees a pprehended

During the period 1 August 2010 to 7 May 2012, the ADF has detained 1,355 suspected insurgents. Of these, 106 detainees have been transferred to the Afghan authorities at the National Directorate of Security in Tarin Kowt and 70 detainees have been transferred to US authorities at the Detention Facility in Parwan.

Since the commencement of interrogation operations in February this year, approximately 20 per cent of detainees apprehended by the ADF have undergone interrogation. Of these, six detainees have subsequently been transferred to US custody in Parwan and three detainees have subsequently been transferred to Afghan custody in Oruzgan.

The size and composition of the interrogation capability is sufficient to support the requirement of our forces operating in Afghanistan.

Allegations of m istreatment

Australia takes all allegations of detainee mistreatment seriously. I have provided regular updates on complaints and allegations of mistreatment the ADF has received against it since August 2010.

During the period 1 August 2010 to 7 May this year, there have been 91 allegations of mistreatment against Australian forces. Of these, 83 related to treatment or an incident at the point of capture. To date, 79 of these allegations have been considered and have been assessed as unsubstantiated. Twelve allegations remain under investigation.

Once reported, allegations are promptly assessed or investigated. This process may include taking witness statements, examining any medical evidence, as well as reviewing records and closed circuit television (CCTV) footage.

Allegations and the outcomes of any assessments are reported to the International Security Assistance Force and key human rights organisations.

CCTV

Australia's Initial Screening Area (ISA) was designed to be closed circuit TV (CCTV) monitored 24 hours a day to ensure the humane treatment of detainees in our custody, and to protect the ADF personnel working within the ISA from erroneous allegations. I have previously reported to the House on the temporary loss of CCTV footage at the ISA.

CCTV footage can be reviewed as part of the ADF's process for assessing allegations. It is an integral part of Australia's governance measures for detention operations within the ISA.

Juveniles and children

Under Australia's detainee management policy, the ADF may apprehend juveniles suspected of insurgent activity who pose a threat to international security assistance forces and the security of the local population. Juveniles are categorised as people between the ages of 15 and 17.

All juveniles apprehended by the ADF while on operations in Afghanistan are treated humanely, with dignity and respect, and in accordance with all of Australia's obligations under domestic and international law.

There are some circumstances where children under the age of 15 may be detained by the ADF in Afghanistan. In all cases, children under the age of 15 are treated in accordance with the international Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Detainee m anagement i ssues

On occasion some issues do arise with respect to the implementation of our detainee operations. In accordance with the government's commitment to transparency, I now update the House on these issues.

Allegations of p rocedural m isconduct

In February 2011, I advised in a public update on detainee management that in late January 2011 the Australian Defence Force Investigative Service (ADFIS) had initiated an investigation into allegations made by a Defence member that previous members of the Detainee Management Team in Afghanistan, responsible for managing the ADF Initial Screening Area, the ISA, at Tarin Kowt, may not have complied with procedures relating to the management and administrative processing of detainees.

As I have advised the House on a number of occasions since, that matter remained under consideration throughout 2011. I committed to advising on the outcomes of that investigation in due course. I am now in a position to do so.

Following the ADFIS investigation and subsequent referral of a brief of evidence to the Director of Military Prosecutions, three members of the previous Detainee Management Team have been charged with disciplinary offences relating to falsification of service documents relating to detainees.

There is no allegation or evidence to suggest that the detainees were mistreated by the Detainee Management Team.

As this matter is now the subject to disciplinary proceedings, I am not proposing to comment further at this stage. Once these proceedings are complete, I will provide a further update to the House on this matter.

Review of questioning techniques

The ADF is conducting a review into aspects of the questioning techniques used during the initial screening of detainees in Afghanistan during 2010 and 2011.

During 2010 and 2011, the ADF was limited to conducting tactical questioning and debriefing of detainees apprehended in Afghanistan.

The Chief of the Defence Force, the CDF, has advised that a recent review of records from this period has identified the possible use of unauthorised questioning techniques when interviewing detainees in the ISA during this period.

The irregularities identified during the possible use of unauthorised questioning techniques are limited to inappropriate language and do not include—do not include—any alleged physical mistreatment of detainees in the ISA by ADF personnel.

Again, once this review is complete, I will provide a further update to the House.

Detention facility in Parwan

The final matter I wish to advise the House on relates to the United States run Detention Facility in Parwan.

Australia's detainee transfer arrangements include the ability for those insurgents assessed as posing a serious and continued threat to Australian or ISAF forces, and the Afghan people, to be transferred to the Detention Facility in Parwan.

The United States and Afghanistan signed an agreement on 9 March this year to commence the transfer of the Detention Facility in Parwan to Afghan control. It has always been Australia's understanding, and expectation, that the Detention Facility in Parwan would transition to Afghan control at an appropriate time.

This is a positive development for the Afghan government and the Afghan authorities and is a step towards the transition of security across Afghanistan.

There are currently 56 detainees apprehended by the ADF in the Detention Facility in Parwan who would be included in the memorandum signed by the United States and Afghan governments.

Australia has a detainee transfer arrangement with the Afghan government which includes assurances that detainees apprehended by the ADF and held in Afghan custody will be treated humanely. The arrangement also provides access for Australian officials to monitor the welfare of ADF transferred detainees.

These detainees have been regularly monitored by the Interagency Detainee Monitoring Team and, to date, no major concerns have been identified with their treatment.

I discussed the transition of the Detention Facility in Parwan with my Afghan counterpart, Minister Wardak, in Brussels recently, and with the Afghan Minister for Foreign Affairs, Minister Rassoul, in Kabul recently. I asked for, and was given, assurances that as the Detention Facility in Parwan transitions to Afghan control, Afghanistan would ensure continued access for Australian officials to monitor detainees transferred to the Detention Facility in Parwan by the ADF. Summary

I will continue to provide regular updates to Parliament and the Australian people on ADF detention operations in Afghanistan, as well as on the broader aspects of Australia's engagement in Afghanistan.

Madam Deputy Speaker, I table a paper, tabled in conjunction with my ministerial statement and I ask leave of the House to move a motion to enable the honourable member for Fadden to speak for 14 minutes.

Leave granted.

I move:

That so much of the standing and sessional orders be suspended as would prevent Mr Robert speaking for a period not exceeding 14 minutes.

Question agreed to.

Stuart Robert (Fadden, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Defence Science, Technology and Personnel) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the minister for his commitment to keeping the parliament informed, which he dutifully did on no fewer than six occasions last year and continues doing this year in the same way. I will address my brief response to the minister in terms of the ISAF leaders' summit, the issue of detainee management, and some questions on capability for future operations in Afghanistan. I look forward to the minister's response from his recent round of discussions and meetings in Brussels with the Prime Minister and of course from the leaders' summit in Chicago, and the minister has indicated he will provide an update to the House following the Chicago round of talks about where combat operations are going in Afghanistan.

The coalition is particularly interested in the withdrawal timetable, noting the minister and the government's pledge that this will be a metrics based, commanders' judgment driven exercise. I think that it is fair to say that there remains some ambiguity on the timelines in terms of Australian withdrawal. The Prime Minister's comments on 16 April that Afghan President Hamid Karzai would announce within the next few months plans to transition Oruzgan to Afghan troop control and that it would take from 12 to 18 months is a clear statement as the Prime Minister has indicated that the bulk of the Mentoring Task Force and the enablers that attach with it would cease their training activities by literally Christmas 2013. The PM further stated at the time:

We will no longer be conducting routine frontline operations with the Afghan National Security Forces. The Australian-led Provincial Reconstruction Team will have completed its work and the majority of our troops will have returned home. We will no longer be conducting routine front-line operations with the Afghan National Security Force. The Australian led Provincial Reconstruction Team will have completed its work.

I think she actually meant the Mentoring Task Force because, if we are pulling the Provincial Reconstruction Team out, we will be doing no reconstruction at all. Having suggested that she is talking about the MTF and all our troops coming home, it is a fair statement that the Prime Minister is anticipating the cessation of all mentoring and task force related activities within our forward operating bases by the end of 2013.

The coalition looks forward to seeing the metrics that support that decision and of course our routine discussions yearly with Commander JTF 633 and Commander CTU to fully understand the basis of that decision. There is no indication that what the PM has said is not correct or that she has not been fully informed by the military hierarchy and those in command. We also note that the US withdrawal and their timeline is driving much of the timeline and much of the tone.

It is important to note that we will continue to offer the strongest bipartisan support for combat operations in Afghanistan. We reiterate, as we have done with every ministerial response, that it is not a blank cheque. Decisions must be made in the national interest and our men and women must return home from a successful fight. We will come home when the job is done—nothing more, nothing less.

I thank the minister for his update on detainee management. It is pleasing to see the primary interrogation capability now in Afghanistan and it is pleasing to see it is now an operational capability with full oversight. I am pleased that the minister has taken the media to actually see the facility and has shown them around, I am sure, with as much access as they require. It is good to note the protocols surrounding a primary interrogation capability in terms of CCTV and that full medical and psychological support are indeed in place and also, within the wider ISAF contingent, that a senior Australian officer is providing oversight for it.

The minister, though, gave no indication of the average time held by detainees within our system, noting that, as the primary interrogation capability was deployed into Afghanistan last year, the maximum time for holding detainees was also extended in line with our ISAF partners. It would be good to understand exactly how many people have now been detained for that longer time period that our ISAF partners have been enjoying for some years.

I note the level of complaints and the numbers that the minister has highlighted and I note that none of the complaints have been found to be substantiated even though the number of complainants is high. That would seem to indicate that those we have detained have misjudged their environment, misjudged the manner in which they were detained or, frankly, are struggling to tell the truth. Noting that most combatants caught on the battlefield will try anything to secure their release, perhaps it is understandable. The important thing to note from the minister's statement is that we are better than this as a nation. As a nation we take complaints seriously. They are investigated under law with all due and proper process, as they should be, and they are publicly reported, as they should be, to the minister's credit.

I note the issue of the ADFIS investigation with respect to the administration irregularities in detainee management. The minister has stated quite publicly that there was no issue in terms of maltreatment of detainees. It was simply an issue, in simple terms, of 'paperwork'. Notwithstanding that, these issues have been investigated and we accept the fact that some degree of administrative law is being dealt out.

We also note the current investigation from 2010-11 into the earlier years of detainee management in terms of tactical questioning and whether that tactical questioning may have inadvertently crossed over into very low levels of interrogation in its technique, and we look forward to being providing with an update as that investigation proceeds. We note, though, that the allegations seem to be limited to the use of some particularly nasty words as opposed to going to any particular physical maltreatment of detainees. I will conclude my response in terms of capability for Afghanistan by saying that, regardless of the drawdown and the timeline of the MTF withdrawal, the Provincial Reconstruction Team, in both civilian and perhaps military guise, will remain in theatre for some time, as will the kinetic activity within the Special Operations Task Group as well as some enablers and some trainers, especially within the artillery training school and, if the minister sees fit to join the British forces with 'Sandhurst in the sand,' then, Minister, I think we should rename that 'Duntroon in the desert'. Cognisant of that extended capability, we may find ourselves with boots on the ground in Afghanistan for many, many, many years to come—albeit with numbers small and specialised in terms of what they do. I note that, with the budget being handed down two days ago, the minister has stated that operational capability will not be impacted. I agree that it would appear that no uniformed personnel numbers have been cut and no units have been cut from the order of battle. But to suggest that operational capability for the future has not been impacted does not, I believe, stand true.

$5.45 billion has been stripped from the budget over the forward estimates. The defence budget as a percentage of GDP is now around 1.6 per cent—the lowest since 1938 when it was 1.55 per cent. We are in the Asia-Pacific century and our Asian-Pacific neighbours, many of them to the north, have defence spending well above 2.5 per cent of GDP. This puts us currently at something like 80th highest in the world in terms of defence spending. They are the biggest cuts since the Korean War finished. Since 2008 this brings the total to $18 billion in cuts. This will have a capability impact in the future. The 2009 white paper, barely a few years old, would seem—by the government's own admission, with their announcement of a new one just last week—to be now discredited and Force 2030 perhaps a pipedream.

In terms of procurement: procurement next financial year is 18 per cent reduced from this financial year. That level stays the same to 2013-14 and then, in the final two out-years, procurement is set to rise a staggering 38 per cent. I do not believe industry—or, frankly, DMO—can cope with a 38 per cent increase in procurement in two years. This will impact future capability. It may well impact future operations despite the best endeavours of Defence and its senior staff.

Considering that we will remain a substantial and lethal kinetic force in the Middle East, as well as a training and oversight force, it is imperative that we provide our men and women with the highest possible training, resources, equipment and capability for them to do their job. I implore the minister, as the days and weeks and months go on, to do everything he can to realise greater efficiency and put more dollars and cents into our fighting force.

Stephen Smith (Perth, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

on indulgence—The member for Fadden raised a question about statistics on the time that detainees have been kept. I am very happy to get that information from the Chief of the Defence Force and relay it to him privately, but I indicated that very many of the matters that he raised will be the subject of a further report by me, post Chicago.

On capability matters: just for the information of the member and the House, this morning I have announced, in terms of capability, that the government will acquire, at a cost of $1.4 billion, 10 C-27 tactical military airlift aircraft for the purposes of completing our Air Force aircraft capability to lift, complementing our C-17s, of which we have purchased two additional ones, and our C-130J airlift capability.

Stuart Robert (Fadden, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Defence Science, Technology and Personnel) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

on indulgence—Considering the 10 C-27Js are available because of a cancellation and, therefore, available at a very good price and option, may I commend the minister for a quick and sound decision. It is a very good capability. The loss of the Caribou was quite a loss in terms of short take-off and landing. The C-27J will add significant capability to our arsenal. So while, in the last few days, Minister, there has been a barrage of marginal decisions, may I say, Sir, this is a very good one.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No more indulgence for people talking about defence is going to be granted.