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

Or perhaps ever. As a trained interrogator, I know patently well what is involved in the art and science of interrogation, how we deploy it and what we do with it. I also say to Minister Smith that I have spent 24 quality hours in one of our Australian interrogation centres. It is very hard to be an interrogator unless you have undergone the process of being interrogated to know how both sides of the fence work.

With that experience from my former military days—looking across at the member for Eden-Monaro, a former colonel in the military who has great experience in this matter as well—I can say with some authority that the minister's decision to employ the full gamut of interrogation capability, based on 12 months of deliberation and making sure things will work appropriately, is sound and sensible. It will be managed and monitored. I believe the minister has deployed a one-star general to manage detainee management, so there is tremendous oversight. We will have a full range of interrogators under a suitably senior officer, all videotaped, all managed, with every word and action accountable and this will finally allow Australian forces to fully prosecute all detainees and to seek out, through tactical questioning, the information detainees may hold and the value that information may have. We will be able to determine what is more appropriate for which detainees and which should be held for longer periods of time for the full extraction of information that may be worthwhile and of value.

For those who hear the word 'interrogation' and immediately picture Abu Graib, I say with great confidence and experience that that could not be further from the truth of what interrogation capability brings to the fore. We are talking about suitably trained intelligence corps officers. As we know, the intelligence corps of the Australian Army is one of the finest and most professional corps. It will do the nation proud in its use of interrogation.

I note the minister has told of 1,074 detainees from 1 August 2010 to 18 November 2011. That is an enormous number of people captured on the battlefield or detained at checkpoints because of information that had been gathered. People were detained by special forces because they were persons of interest. This enormous number of people needs to be tactically questioned and their information, alibis, equipment and what they have on them needs to be assessed by an intelligence professional. Decisions then need to be made about what to do with them.

With that number of people coming through a detainee management system, it is crucial that we have a viable NDS which we now do as the minister has assured the House, with 154 being passed to the NDS or US forces. That still leaves over 900 people passing through the Australian system, not going to the NDS or the US forces, that the Australian system will either release or now has the opportunity to pass through to a primary interrogation centre for the further extraction of valuable information. I think we can all be assured that our ISAF partners will be incredibly pleased with the decision that has been made. Whilst we look at a number of people recaptured, that is inevitable within a theatre of combat operations. Now, hopefully, with the implementation of the PIC, we will see the incidence of recapturing and redetaining certainly reduced as we can more formally address the issue of information extraction.

I note that the minister has said that of the 30 or 40 allegations that have been fully investigated, for those who have actually made complaints within our detaining facility none have had any basis to them. I suggest with some confidence that probably none ever will. I think it is axiomatic that those detained on the battlefield—especially knowing full well that we are a First World nation and we operate within the rule of law, a nation that is accountable, and that detainee numbers will be reported to the people within parliament and that each investigation will have suitable oversight—are well aware of the First World rights that they enjoy within our First World facility, and I note that the Taliban would never afford us even a Fourth World right or, indeed any of our soldiers such rights.

Having said that, we are better than that as a nation. We are better than who they are and what they do in terms of their actions. So it is important that we continue to thoroughly investigate each allegation as it arises, noting that those to date have had no basis, and we will continue to investigate and to show the Afghan authorities, as well as the nongovernment sector within Afghanistan, that we follow complaints to the letter of the law. It is important that our soldiers, sailors and airmen also understand that we will continue to follow those processes wherever we go.

I can only assume that the minister will continue next year his tradition this year of updating the House at least every quarter—I see a nod from the minister—to ensure that the parliament is fully abreast of where things are going in Afghanistan. The next year will be a decisive year in terms of combat operations. This year, over the last winter, the Taliban have not regained any of the losses through the last fighting season leading into the next. They have not regained any of the initiatives. As the 2nd Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, prepares from MTF-3 to transition across to MTF-4 based on the 8th and 9th Battalion over the Christmas period, it is my expectation from looking at what our soldiers, sailors and airmen have done to date, that that initiative will not be resumed by the Taliban. Next year we will see a transitioning down from more patrol bases to mobile mentoring teams. It will see the further destruction of the intelligence, communications and command elements of the Taliban, and further economic development within the community.

Let us not underestimate the value of economic activity or the work that the Provincial Reconstruction Team is doing. When the sealed road from Chora to Tarin Kowt went in, the price of palm oil in Chora, that used to be seven times that in Tarin Kowt, dropped to only twice that price. That type of productivity improvement—using the language we would use in parliament—is fundamental to the lives of people. And whilst many of the people will question the legitimacy of the government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, Jawara, it is incredibly difficult to say that the ISAF forces are not delivering value when suddenly the price of palm oil has dropped from seven times down to two. It is a tangible reminder of the value of what we are doing in theatre.

I thank the minister again for his update to the House. He knows that the government enjoys full coalition support in the prosecution of combat operations. The coalition supports the minister's announcements on the commencement of the transfer of detainees to NDS, the ability to hold from 96 hours to 10 days. We support the implementation of the PIC and the full use of the detaining facility. I thank the minister for his update to the House.

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