KEY POINTS:
The National Party has deflected the latest Iraq salvo by highlighting comments made in the past by Labour ministers.
Defence Minister Phil Goff yesterday sought to embarrass National leader John Key in parliament over his recent comments that the "war in Iraq is over".
"The war was over in a very short period of time and you've now got a situation where the main coalition forces are looking to withdraw their efforts out of Iraq," Mr Key said in an interview on Radio New Zealand last week.
In answer to a question from colleague Diane Yates on whether he had received any reports on the war in Iraq, Mr Goff repeated Mr Key's comments and indignantly asked for an explanation.
Mr Key fidgeted with his papers as Mr Goff wound up the attack.
But Mr Goff's attack hit a brick wall when National MP Gerry Brownlee said Mr Key had taken his cue from former Defence Minister Mark Burton, who in 2003 had talked about "humanitarian and reconstruction aid to post-war Iraq", and Mr Goff himself, who in the same year had "expressed great relief and satisfaction that the conflict in Iraq was short".
Mr Key has said his comments referred to the invasion period rather than the current counter-insurgency in Iraq.
- NZPA
