Independent MP Andrew Wilkie and the Greens are fuming the Abbott government has committed Australia to weapons air drops in Iraq without consulting parliament.
Prime Minister Tony Abbott has agreed to a United States government request for Australia to transport arms and munitions to Kurdish fighters battling Islamic State militants in Iraq.
“The situation in Iraq represents a humanitarian catastrophe,” Mr Abbott said.
The decision has received bipartisan support from Labor.
But Mr Wilkie condemned the cabinet national security committee call saying federal parliament should have had a say on the matter.
“If Tony Abbott wants us to be gun runners for the Kurds at the behest of the United States then we are part of the war,” Mr Wilkie told reporters in Hobart. “We’ve taken sides.”
A former senior intelligence analyst turned whistleblower, Mr Wilkie resigned from his post at the Office of National Assessments in 2003 in protest at Australia’s role in the Iraq war.
Greens leader Christine Milne called on Mr Abbott to suspend all other matters in parliament on Monday to debate Australia’s involvement in Iraq.
Senator Milne asked if the transportation of arms was a sign of “mission creep”, and whether it would lead to troops on the ground. “If we’re going to start, where is it going to end?”
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