Nick Champion (Wakefield, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is obviously a great honour to speak in the Federation Chamber, but this is a debate that should be going on in the House. It is a debate that should be had with all the members of the House. The Middle East, and in particular Syria, is a very important area of strategic concern, and what we have is a government that has gone from excessive and almost obsessive talk of death cults, on one hand, to a deathly silence, on the other. It is very important, given the strategic situation, that we actually discuss what is going on in Syria and the broader Middle East, because there are very big strategic shifts going on and we have a presence there in terms of our ADF personnel. And I know there are many personnel from my own electorate who are serving there. Obviously we have a big interest. We have a strategic interest and a common interest in humanity and in preventing armed conflict.

The situation could not be more desperate—hundreds of thousands of civilians have been killed by the Assad regime, by the Daesh regime and by various armed insurgent groups controlling various bits of territory. This has caused an avalanche of refugees, people fleeing this conflict. These people are legitimately fleeing to Lebanon and Jordan; both of their populations have expanded—in Lebanon's case, by almost a third. We now have a million people seeking asylum in Europe, with perhaps up to three million on their way. The ongoing conflict that is fuelling these movements of desperate and damaged people is accelerating because of the involvement of the participants on the ground—Daesh and the various armed insurgent groups of the Assad regime. It is also accelerating because of the presence of armed personnel of the nations of Iran and now Russia. We have problems in the lower part of Turkey; it is a very serious expansion of the conflict. And we have big things happening in this part of the world in terms of the emergence of Kurdistan—if not as a nation, then as a governing entity—reaching beyond the borders of Iraq. That has some very big challenges, given that this is pretty much the first time since the Treaty of Sevres that this has been contemplated.

We should be debating these big strategic shifts in the House of Representatives, and debating the causes of them: the breakdown of Ottoman rule; the breakdown of the model that replaced it, the Sykes-Picot agreement; and these nations of Iraq and Syria and others that were basically drawn by Europeans after the First World War. There has been very serious breakdown and very serious conflict. On top of that, we have the emergence of Iran as a regional player coming out of a self-imposed isolation in part, moving away from the development of nuclear weapons. That is to be welcomed, but we have to be very cautious in terms of Iran because they have killed and tortured their own citizens to prevent regime change in that country. We seem to have, as the member for Melbourne Ports articulates, a change of government policy in regard to Iran, which is very serious indeed.

To conclude, we should have a full debate, and every member of this House should participate in and contribute to that debate. We might learn something from one another, and we might think about what useful role Australia can play in diplomatic and military terms, in terms of our humanitarian policies and in terms of what expanded role we might play in this area to bring peace to what is a very troublesome and very troubled area of the world.

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am pleased to speak on this debate moved by the member for Sydney, but I must admit I am a bit confused. This seems to be a debate about having a debate. If the member for Sydney has, or any members of the opposition have, any criticism of Australia's current policy in Syria and Iraq, then surely this is the time to bring it up, rather than saying we want to have a debate about having a debate. If they have some criticism about it, please—you have the opportunity. Raise your criticisms here during this debate rather than come in here saying, 'Let's have a debate about having a debate.'

If we are to have a debate on the issues of Syria, the first thing we need to admit is the past mistakes that have been made. We also need to admit that we here in Australia are not going to solve the Syrian civil war by debating it in our parliament. We in Australia are going to do very little to solve the problems of the Syrian war, except that we can act in concert with our allies.

Firstly, I will turn to some of the past mistakes that we have made. The mistakes go back to those heady days of the Arab Spring, when it was thought—mistakenly—in many Western nations that we could simply transform the Middle East overnight into some sort of democratic utopia. It makes us realise how fragile democracies are and how hard they are to build. You cannot just install a democracy in a country overnight; you first have to build up those democratic institutions that we in Australia have been so lucky to inherit from England. We also need to admit the mistakes that have been made in countries such as Libya. We tried to topple Gaddafi, but all that did was create a vacuum for chaos.

What have we seen in Syria so far, supporting the so-called moderate rebels? This has been an utter disaster. We have seen at least a quarter of a million Syrian deaths. We have seen 11 million people forced from their homes. We have four million people who have actually fled the country—perhaps the largest refugee exodus in modern times. We are seeing the chaos in Europe, with hundreds of thousands of people—close to a million people—on the move. It will potentially transform Europe forever. We have also seen—of most concern—that we have created the ground for ISIS to increase their influence.

If we are going to continue a debate about Syria, I say that the first policy should be about defeating ISIS. That should be the very first, No. 1 policy of this government, of the United Nations and of our friends and allies. We also need to be very suspicious of the Russians and their actions in Syria. It is very clear that the Russians are only interested in looking after their Mediterranean ports in Syria, rather than actually defeating the terrorists in Syria.

There have been many mistakes that have been made in the Syrian crisis. As I said, we need to work on defeating ISIS first. But what we have done as the government is to take humanitarian steps in this crisis—something I think all Australians should be proud of. To take 12,000 refugees from Syria—yes, in the overall numbers of refugees in Syria, it is not a lot, but 12,000 is still a significant number. We will change those people's lives. It was heartening to see our Minister for Immigration and Border Protection, Minister Dutton, over there in Syria, when he was notifying people from Syria that they had been granted a visa to Australia. I remember one gentlemen standing there—I am sure we all saw it on television—who said, 'I have won the lottery.' To be granted a visa to come to Australia is like winning the lottery. That is something we should all remember every single day, whether we were born here or whether we migrated to this country. We have won the lottery in life. We get to live here in Australia, the greatest country in the world, and not in the tragedy that we see currently going on in Syria. Also, we have been proud to announce an extra $44 million in humanitarian assistance for people displaced by fighting in Syria and Iraq.

Finally, we should give support to our troops currently serving in Syria. As we approach Remembrance Day, we should remember that we have troops actively fighting on the ground today. (Time expired)

Gai Brodtmann (Canberra, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In the last sitting fortnight the Deputy Leader of the Opposition called for greater parliamentary scrutiny of the government's response strategy regarding the crisis in Syria and Iraq. I rise today to second the motion and again call for greater scrutiny.

As we all know, the current situation in Syria and Iraq is incredibly grim. Large sections of both countries are currently under the control of ISIS. Australians have seen the horrific actions of ISIS militants and the drastic actions many are forced to take to escape them. We have seen the footage of hundreds of thousands of Syrians and Iraqis who have been forced to flee their homes, waiting at EU borders to try to find safety. We have all seen the image of Aylan Kurdi, whose little body washed up on the shore—that horrific image that will stay with us forever.

There is no question of just how little regard ISIS has for human life. We have seen public executions, we have seen slavery and we have seen systematic sexual abuse. We have seen some of the most unspeakable acts of sexual violence, where rape and sexual abuse are not just a by-product of war but used as a deliberate military strategy to degrade the enemy. Horrifyingly, we have learnt that girls from Iraq and Syria have been stripped and sold and, in some cases, made to undergo over a dozen virginity restoration surgeries. These are just some of the reasons why the international community must fight and defeat ISIS. Our response must be as coordinated and effective as possible, and it also has to be compassionate when it comes to the refugees. I welcome the government's commitment to taking on an additional 12,000 refugees, after Labor called on the government to increase our existing intake.

Labor is now calling on the government to make Australia's objectives in Iraq as transparent as possible. Australians have the right to know what the objectives are, what the strategy involves and what our exit strategy would look like. In 2003, while talking about the situation in Iraq, the then foreign minister said to this House, 'What is next? What does the future hold for a liberated Iraq?' Those questions remain relevant today. If the government's strategy truly is as effective and well-thought out as it maintains, then it should welcome some scrutiny from this parliament. This is particularly important at a time when the government strategy appears to be mixed, appears to be confused and appears to be constantly subject to change. The government must clarify whether it sees the Assad regime as part of the short-term solution, as part of the medium-term solution or as part of the long-term solution. It has had a position that has jumped all around on this in recent months. It has been all over the place on this and you have seen varying reactions from the Russians in terms of the role that the Assad regime was playing in the short, medium and long term. The government must also clarify our objective in Iraq. What does the strategy aim to achieve and what is the long-term vision?

While I welcome the government's $44 million commitment to the situation in Syria and Iraq, this is more mixed messaging from a government that has also reduced our aid budget for the Middle East and North Africa by 82 per cent. This government cut the foreign aid budget by $11.3 billion in this year's budget, at a time when the UNHCR estimates there are more than 60 million forcibly displaced people in the world. What does this say about the coherence of the government's response and approach? The government's strategy must be clearer and it must be more transparent, because the situation we face is complex, as we have heard today from the member for Wakefield. It has many elements, which include the military strategy, the political strategy and the humanitarian aid and assistance strategy for refugees. Increased parliamentary scrutiny of the government strategy in Iraq is something that I believe many Australians would welcome. I know that most Canberrans would welcome it too. They are entitled to hear the government's plan for how this increasingly complex scenario in the Middle East will be resolved.

Labor is and always has been prepared to support a strategy that will adequately address the horrific humanitarian crises of Iraq and Syria. Labor believes that the Australian people have a right to know what the government's proposed objective is and what the government's strategy is—and to be able to judge whether it will work. It is very important to have the people onside on this issue. We have a number of ADF staff members deployed to the region and it is so important that they actually know the purpose of their mission. One way to secure Australia's confidence in their plan is to open it up to parliamentary debate, and this is what Labor calls on the government— (Time expired)

Debate adjourned.