(AAP/The Age)
Australia is unlikely to send more troops to Iraq despite fresh outbreaks of violence, Prime Minister John Howard said today.
The United States is considering sending rapid-response forces to Iraq to bolster troops after a bloody surge in fighting between US forces and Shi'ite Muslim groups at the weekend.
But Mr Howard said Australia had no plans to send more troops to Iraq.
"We don't have any plans to provide more," Mr Howard told journalists in Auckland.
"We have about 850 troops there and personnel there at the present time and they're playing a very important role.
"They'll stay there until the job is done."
Asked if he was leaving the door open to send more troops if asked, Mr Howard said: "We don't have any plans and I'm not even looking at doors.
"I'm sort of quite content with the room I'm in."
Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, who had talks with US Secretary of State Colin Powell last week, said it was unlikely Australia would be asked to contribute.
"We haven't had any requests from the Americans," Mr Downer told reporters in Adelaide.
"I met with the Secretary of State just last week and we didn't talk about any extra Australian troops going to Iraq.
"The Americans have made no request, and ... I don't think that that's an issue on our agenda."
But Mr Downer said it was important the Australian troops still in Iraq stayed until the job of rebuilding was finished, seizing on remarks by former Labor deputy prime minister Gareth Evans that the troops should stay.
"I didn't think that going to war was a great idea, but I do think that the international community has a responsibility to see this through now," Mr Evans, foreign minister in the Keating government and now head of the International Crisis Group, told a media briefing in Beijing.
His comments were seen as a rebuff to federal Opposition Leader Mark Latham, who last month said he planned to bring Australian troops home by Christmas if elected, and coincided with a Newspoll showing a drop in Mr Latham's popularity.
Mr Downer and Mr Howard said it highlighted Mr Latham's inexperience and his flawed and opportunistic policy.
"There's no way that this was a considered policy, it was made up on a radio program," Mr Howard told reporters.
"The Labor Party is now locked in to a fundamentally wrong position and that is that our troops come out, come what may, at the end of the year if Labor were to win.
"It's a wrong policy and what Gareth Evans has said has reinforced the ill wisdom of the stance that (Mr Latham's) taken."
Mr Downer said the contrast between Mr Latham, who took over the Labor leadership last December, and Mr Evans, a foreign minister for more than seven years and part of a team reviewing the United Nations, was simple.
"Mr Evans is experienced, Mr Latham is inexperienced, and Mr Latham's inexperience, his loose use of language, his policy on the run, is dangerous for Australia," Mr Downer said.
Mr Latham was on his way back from New Zealand today and was unavailable for comment.
But opposition health spokesman Stephen Smith said he thought Mr Evans had been paraphrased and taken out of context.
"In any event, irrespective of what Gareth's view is, we made a decision which we believe is in the national interest and we're sticking by that," Mr Smith told reporters in Sydney.
Australia is unlikely to send more troops to Iraq despite fresh outbreaks of violence, Prime Minister John Howard said today.
The United States is considering sending rapid-response forces to Iraq to bolster troops after a bloody surge in fighting between US forces and Shi'ite Muslim groups at the weekend.
But Mr Howard said Australia had no plans to send more troops to Iraq.
"We don't have any plans to provide more," Mr Howard told journalists in Auckland.
"We have about 850 troops there and personnel there at the present time and they're playing a very important role.
"They'll stay there until the job is done."
Asked if he was leaving the door open to send more troops if asked, Mr Howard said: "We don't have any plans and I'm not even looking at doors.
"I'm sort of quite content with the room I'm in."
Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, who had talks with US Secretary of State Colin Powell last week, said it was unlikely Australia would be asked to contribute.
"We haven't had any requests from the Americans," Mr Downer told reporters in Adelaide.
"I met with the Secretary of State just last week and we didn't talk about any extra Australian troops going to Iraq.
"The Americans have made no request, and ... I don't think that that's an issue on our agenda."
But Mr Downer said it was important the Australian troops still in Iraq stayed until the job of rebuilding was finished, seizing on remarks by former Labor deputy prime minister Gareth Evans that the troops should stay.
"I didn't think that going to war was a great idea, but I do think that the international community has a responsibility to see this through now," Mr Evans, foreign minister in the Keating government and now head of the International Crisis Group, told a media briefing in Beijing.
His comments were seen as a rebuff to federal Opposition Leader Mark Latham, who last month said he planned to bring Australian troops home by Christmas if elected, and coincided with a Newspoll showing a drop in Mr Latham's popularity.
Mr Downer and Mr Howard said it highlighted Mr Latham's inexperience and his flawed and opportunistic policy.
"There's no way that this was a considered policy, it was made up on a radio program," Mr Howard told reporters.
"The Labor Party is now locked in to a fundamentally wrong position and that is that our troops come out, come what may, at the end of the year if Labor were to win.
"It's a wrong policy and what Gareth Evans has said has reinforced the ill wisdom of the stance that (Mr Latham's) taken."
Mr Downer said the contrast between Mr Latham, who took over the Labor leadership last December, and Mr Evans, a foreign minister for more than seven years and part of a team reviewing the United Nations, was simple.
"Mr Evans is experienced, Mr Latham is inexperienced, and Mr Latham's inexperience, his loose use of language, his policy on the run, is dangerous for Australia," Mr Downer said.
Mr Latham was on his way back from New Zealand today and was unavailable for comment.
But opposition health spokesman Stephen Smith said he thought Mr Evans had been paraphrased and taken out of context.
"In any event, irrespective of what Gareth's view is, we made a decision which we believe is in the national interest and we're sticking by that," Mr Smith told reporters in Sydney.
