Linda Reynolds (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I too rise to speak in support of this motion. So often in this chamber we talk about statistics, we talk about numbers, but we don't always talk about people. What I'd like to talk about today, in support of this motion, is the last 20 years of my life. While I didn't serve in Afghanistan, what happened in Afghanistan in 2001, and subsequently through to this year, has been a reoccurring theme in my life. I would like to share that with the chamber today, because I believe it reflects the disservice but also the support of so many Australians. Unlike what we've just heard in the chamber from previous speakers, I believe how Australia responded to the world trade towers, the Pentagon and all the aircraft that were downed during all those attacks right through to today shows the best of Australians. Our response over that 20 years shows us that Australia is a strong nation. We are a compassionate nation and we are good people. We are generous and we are welcoming.

My journey with Afghanistan started with the bombing of the world trade towers. I was Chief of Staff to the Minister for Justice and Customs at the time. If you will recall, the Prime Minister was actually in Washington on the day. Like everybody in this chamber who is old enough to remember that footage and those events we watched with horror and incredulity at the images of those passenger aircraft deliberately being flown into towers, into the Pentagon and into the ground. As we gathered here in the building to assess what it all meant, the first question for us all was: where is our Prime Minister? Is he alive and is he safe? Once we had ascertained that it quickly pivoted to being all about the response. What do we need to do for Australia? What do we need to do with our like-minded partners globally?

Just to remind people of the impacts, nearly 3,000 people from many, many nations were killed on that day and that included 10 Australians. Very quickly, on 14 September Australia invoked Article IV of the ANZUS treaty. For the following 20 years we conducted two operations in Afghanistan continuously. The first, from November 2001 to December 2014, was Operation Slipper. That was followed by Operation Highroad, from January 2015 to mid-2021—when the last of our ADF personnel withdrew from Afghanistan.

In total, over those nearly 20 years, 39,000 of our service men and women—full-time, part-time, Army, Air Force and Navy—served in Afghanistan and also in support of those who were actually in country in Afghanistan. At its peak of our military deployment we had 1,500 personnel based there at any one time. Tragically, we also lost 41 Australian service personnel, personnel who came home in coffins to grieving families. As a nation we will always commemorate their service and thank their families and support their families, who still grieve to this day.

Tens of thousands of Afghan citizens also lost their lives over those 20 years. Two hundred and sixty Australians returned home seriously wounded and many thousands more returned home with injuries that weren't as visible, with mental health issues that are still with many of them today. I think Senator Wong and Senator Birmingham very eloquently summed up the impact over the last 12 months of the return of the Taliban. I think it is worth reflecting on a few things and asking us the question: was it really all worth it? I would say absolutely, yes, it was worth it.

The Taliban have a strategy that it is encapsulated in the saying, 'You have the watches and we have the time,' which reflects their strategy of waiting out foreign forces in their nation. That is clearly what we saw 12 months ago.

So was it worth it? I know that is something considered by many service personnel who have returned home—including service personnel with lifelong wounds—and their family members. As I said, I believe that it was. Have a look at what was achieved while the coalition forces were there. The proportion of girls attending secondary school rose from six per cent to well over 40 per cent. The proportion of boys attending secondary school rose from 18 per cent to over 70 per cent. Female literacy in 15- to 24-year-olds rose from 11 per cent in 2001 to 56 per cent. Male literacy in the same age group rose from 46 per cent to 74 per cent. Women, who'd previously been banned from higher education under the Taliban 20 years ago, comprised over 30 per cent of university students.

Coming through to subsequent circumstances, while I didn't serve in Afghanistan it was a recurring theme in my career and my life. I had the privilege as the Minister for Defence to visit Operation Highroad in 2019 and to meet the many men and women who were serving there in conditions where there were still clearly threats. There were still attacks on our accommodation and it was still very dangerous flying in and flying out of Kabul. But they were there. They were in high spirits and they could see the difference they were making every single day. And they were so proud of what they were doing in the community for community development: the schools they'd built; the people they'd educated—the service personnel, the carpenters, the builders and the girls. They made a lasting and enduring difference. On this upcoming anniversary I hope that all of our service personnel—the 39,000—will remember the great things they did.

Coming back to almost one year ago today, the Taliban, true to their word—we had the clocks and they had the time—returned. We've heard here today the devastating impacts and consequences of that. What shows the best of Australians is that we joined with so many other like-minded countries to form an airbridge out of Hamid Karzai International Airport. We had 32 flights out of Hamid Karzai in the most challenging and difficult of circumstances, and we evacuated over 4,000 Afghan nationals during that time—part of the 80,000 in total who were airlifted by other like-minded countries during that period. Like many people in this chamber, and many people we know throughout this building and in the other place, many of us were working furiously to try and get out a whole range of people who needed to be evacuated.

I would like to share with the chamber the story of 16 of those 4,000 people who were evacuated in the most traumatic, difficult circumstances out of Hamid Karzai airport. On 15 August I sent a message to my friend, Shukria Barakzai. Shukria had been an underground teacher under the Taliban and an MP in the Afghan parliament. She was also the survivor of a Taliban suicide attack, an experience she emerged from alive but terribly scarred mentally and physically. I contacted her, knowing she was still in Kabul, and asked her what I could do and did she need any help to get out because her life was clearly in great danger. She said to me, 'No, I will be fine, but there are others who you need to help.' One of them, she said, was a young, outspoken journalist whose name was Khalid Amiri, who she said was in immense trouble, and was facing death threats from the Taliban. She said he needed to be removed from Afghanistan so that some of the young voices—some of those young Afghans who had been educated and who are very supportive of a modern, free and democratic Afghanistan—could come out so that they could still have their voices heard.

On Twitter I contacted Khalid, having never met him or communicated with him before. That started an extraordinary chain of events which again mirrored so many others. Foreign minister Marise Payne and her staff were working 24/7 on evacuating. Can I now just acknowledge then minister Payne and also her staff, who did an extraordinary job to coordinate the activities, as did the minister for immigration, to get the visas and to get many of these people out. Khalid and his family were under threat, and he was terrified. He had four sisters living at home with him, all of whom had been educated and were professional young women. He also had a married sister and a brother who each had their own children—between them, four daughters and a son—and they were all under immediate threat.

I now have hundreds of WhatsApp messages about how we could get them visas, how we could get them quickly, and how we could get them to safety. It was an extraordinary time. They got the visas, they left their home, they put on women's clothes so they wouldn't be identified. We tried to get them through the Taliban checkpoints into the French embassy. That didn't succeed. They then moved to Abbey Gate. Everybody has seen those pictures of thousands and thousands of people trying to get through Abbey Gate and over the fences. They were very tense days and hours.

But then I got a text message from Khalid as I was leaving this chamber, after I hadn't heard from him for hours. He sent me a photo from right on the wall at Abbey Gate, and I could see two marines sitting there on the gates with other people around. I asked Khalid to give his phone to the marine to see whether an Australian voice would help the marine help him and his family through to the Australian evacuation point. Wonderfully, this marine, whose name I cannot mention but who has been thanked, came on the phone. There was this Australian voice who asked him to take my word that these people had Australian visas, and he did. He took Khalid, his mother and father and four of his sisters to the Australian collection point. Then the rest of the process as it unfolded: Khalid and his family got on the C-17 at Al Minhad Air Base with the Australian soldiers, and then through to Howard Springs and to Melbourne. Wonderfully, his brother and sister and their families are now also reunited with them in Melbourne.

They will be extraordinary Australians. It is the stories of the 16 members of the Amiri family plus everybody else who we were able to get out and who we are supporting today. They, along with the other 80,000, are the future of Afghanistan. It is our great hope that they will be able to return to Afghanistan and that the Taliban will once again fall. In the meantime, they are here in Australia. The girls are studying. They will be great contributors to the Australian economy. Their nieces in particular will have a very different future. Whether they become Australian citizens and stay here, or whether they are able to return to Afghanistan, I think they demonstrate that it was worth it. I hope that in those stories, and in the stories of every other Afghan who has been ripped from their nation and has come to Australia or gone elsewhere, our service men and women and the families of those who were killed will find great solace.