Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Defence and it is about Afghanistan. I quote from Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the United States, who told the Senate Armed Services Committee yesterday:

I consider the threat from lack of governance to be equal to the threat from the Taliban.

I ask the minister: is it true that EU monitors are saying that one in three votes is under question and that variously the authorities in Afghanistan are checking 1.5 million votes? What is to be done with this highly fraudulent election process in Afghanistan, and what action is this government contemplating taking in view of the fact that it is hardly credible now that a result could go to President Karzai?