David Shoebridge (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Today the Albanese government sent even more Australian troops to the Red Sea as part of a US bombing campaign on Yemen. Make no mistake, Australia has once again followed the US into another war—just like with Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq. And if you wanted more proof of how the Albanese government, by signing up to the AUKUS deal, signed away any last shreds of an independent foreign policy, then this is it.

When the bombing started in Yemen, supported by Australia, it wasn't defence minister Marles, foreign minister Wong or Prime Minister Albanese who let us know; it was the US Department of State. The US announced that Australia was at war. No-one from this government even spoke about it until hours later. These attacks follow a decade-long war in Yemen, one that has killed at 370,000 people, with 60 per cent of those deaths due to the lack of health care and food and 70 per cent being kids under the age of five.

This entire conflict, with all the death and destruction, was fully backed in by the US—and, of course, Australia. It's a deep shame that, as with so many other conflicts, Australia fuelled this violence, providing vast amounts of military equipment to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates during the war, despite the notorious human rights abuses that they committed. Now we're sending more troops and more support for the bombing of a country we already helped set on fire.

The next time anyone from the Albanese government talks about a rules based international order, think about who wrote those rules and why. The public doesn't want to be bombing another country. Most Australians want their country to be a force for peace. But this isn't about what the Australian public wants. It's about what Washington wants, and for Labor that's always the trump card.