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More Australian troops for Afghanistan after expected US request
The Australian - March 31, 2009
Mark Dodd – The federal Government is paving the way to increase its effort in Afghanistan in preparation for an expected request from the US to send more troops to the conflict-ravaged country.
Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said any US request for more troops would be considered on its merits, and Australia was "in the market" to increase its training role for police and the Afghan army.
Mr Smith's comments in Perth come on the eve of a UN-sponsored conference on Afghanistan in The Hague, intended to broaden international support for the increasingly unpopular war.
It is the closest the Foreign Minister has come to saying Australia is preparing to send more troops above its current deployment of 1100.
Solving Afghanistan's problems required not just a military solution, Mr Smith said.
"We have not received a formal request from the US to increase that (deployment). "But, I think there is an expectation, as the (US) review makes clear, that the United States is looking for additional contributions from the international community. I've also made it clear in the past that we, having already a substantial contribution, including the training of Afghanistan army and police personnel – that we are in the market to increase that contribution," he said.
Any additional troop contribution by Australia should not be used as an excuse by other countries involved in Afghanistan not to make an appropriate commitment themselves, Mr Smith said.
Despite suffering 10 combat fatalities, Australia was committed for a long-term engagement in Afghanistan, an engagement that was very much in the national interest and the interests of the international community, he said.
Australia's troop commitment, based mostly in southern Oruzgan province, includes a 300-strong special forces task group responsible for combat operations.
Other elements of the Australian Defence Force deployment are involved in civic reconstruction and training of the Afghan National Army.
The Hague meeting, which gets under way today, was significant because for the first time it brought together the UN, Afghanistan and other regional countries that had not previously been involved in the conflict, the foreign minister said.
An important aspect of US President Barack Obama's new Afghanistan doctrine is the emphasis that a military solution alone is not an answer to a growing Taliban insurgency.
Solving the problems of Pakistan's lawless northwest tribal regions now ranks alongside the emphasis on rebuilding Afghanistan's state institutions and the training of its security forces and civilian bureaucracy.
Violence continued in Afghanistan yesterday. A suicide attack inside a district government compound in the southern part of the country killed six civilians and two policemen, a provincial spokesman said.
The bomber detonated explosives strapped to his body inside the Andar district headquarters of Kandahar province, said the spokesman, Zalmai Ayobi.
"Six civilians and two police were martyred. Four civilians and two police were wounded in the blast," he said.
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