Australia's Department of Defence dismissed a newspaper account on 28 August 2004 claiming that 30 to 40 SAS-trained soldiers were part of a US-led covert program in Iraq, calling the report "factually incorrect and misleading."
The Australian Financial Review said the soldiers, supported by more than 200 personnel across the Middle East and Australia, were involved in operations ranging from kidnapping to a broad range of special activities. They were reportedly based at an undisclosed location in a Gulf state, with an Australian civilian nominally in charge.
Training took place at a facility outside Paris used by France's National Police Intervention Group (GIGN), with instructors drawn from the CIA's covert branch and GIGN staff. The course covered assassination techniques. Australian soldiers had not yet been called on to perform them, the paper reported, though other teams under French and US supervision reportedly had.
The Defence Department acknowledged that a small number of special forces personnel were in Iraq for third-country deployments or protective security duties, but denied any organized covert unit was active there. The story appeared weeks before a general election in which the government's credibility was expected to be a central campaign issue.
Historical summary. TurkishPress restated this AFP wire report, first published in August 2004, in its own words.