By NNN-Bernama,
Melbourne : Australian Defence Minister Joel Fitzgibbon has paid a visit to Australian troops in Afghanistan following the death of a commando this week.
Fitzgibbon flew to Afghanistan to meet with colleagues of Lance Corporal Jason Marks who was killed in a Taliban attack on Sunday, the Australian Associated Press (AAP) news agency reported.
He said despite the tragedy, the soldiers were generally in good spirits. “Morale on the ground, I would have to say, given the events of this week, was very, very good,” he told Sky News.
Fitzgibbon said he assured the troops Australia was behind them. “I think they were generally appreciative that I came to extend the prime minister’s message and of course the message from the whole of the government and indeed all Australian people that we are with them in their time of mourning,” he was reported as saying.
“And we appreciate what they are doing in Afghanistan — they are doing it in a most professional and successful way — and to reassure them that they have the full support of the government.”
Fitzgibbon echoed Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s call at the NATO summit in Romania last month for more coherent planning by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato) forces in the troubled nation, combining military and civilian strategies.
“We review the deployment on a regular basis, that’s the only responsible thing to do, but we acknowledge that if we are going to have long term success in Afghanistan the military effort will need to be in place for some time to come,” he said.
“Now how long that is, is an open question, but obviously it’s going to be a shorter period of time if we can get a coherent team in place which properly knows the military and non-military contribution.”