Troops overstretched: Aus Defence minister
"We have enormous concurrency issues, our troops are overstretched with commitments in East Timor, Afghanistan and Iraq, roughly half of our infantry and cavalry is somehow tied to those deployments," Fitzgibbon said.
Australia, which was one of the first to commit troops to the Iraq war five years ago, held a flag-lowering ceremony yesterday to mark the withdrawal of about 550 soldiers from southern Iraq.
"This is the right time to bring them home," he said. Defence force head, Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston, said he felt no concern about pulling the troops out now.
"Our mission was operational overwatch and training in southern Iraq and we have finished that mission and I think we can hold our heads very high," he was quoted by media here.
The government plans to give a welcome ceremony for the troop on 28th June. "They'll all be back in time for welcome home ceremony," Houston said.
Canberra will still have around 1000 personnel deployed in support of the war but majority of them will be based in Iraq's neighbouring countries.
"The extraction team will remain for some time into perhaps late July and maybe August and most of the activity will be in neighbouring countries," he said.
Defence Minister Fitzgibbon said the Iraqi government had knocked back an offer to bring police to Australia for training. "We're certainly continuing the offer to train police here in Australia," he said.
"The Iraqi government advises us that at this point in time they don't see efficacy in training outside the country. The ball is in their court".