Australia offers help for bombing IS targets in Syria: media

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott pushed the United States to request that Australian jets run bombing missions on the Islamic State (IS) strongholds in Syria, according to a local media report on Wednesday.

On Tuesday, Abbott told reporters that U.S President Barack Obama had personally asked Australia to consider expanding its aerial operations in the Middle East into Syria.

But Fairfax Media, quoting "senior government sources" has reported that it was the prime minister's office that asked Washington to request more from Australia's military.

According to the report, Abbott brought up the possibility when he called the U.S. president to offer sympathies for the mass cinema shootings that occurred in Tennessee in June.

The pair is understood to have then talked about the feasibility and possibility of using Australian fighter jets to conduct air strikes in Syria.

The government has on Wednesday denied the claims, with a spokesperson for Defense Minister Kevin Andrews telling Fairfax Media the formal request first came from the United States, without a prompt from the Australian government.

"As the PM has said today, this was first raised with him by the president of the United States," the spokesperson said on Wednesday.

"Now that the U.S. Secretary of Defense has asked Australia to consider extending its current counter-Daesh air operations into Syria, the government will consider this request in the normal way, and in close consultation with our coalition partners."

Meanwhile, a former Australian foreign minister has on Wednesday said the nation has a "moral obligation" to bomb IS strongholds in Syria.

Bob Carr, Minister for Foreign Affairs between 2012 and late 2013, said the "mass atrocities" occurring in the region was reason enough for Australia to ramp-up its efforts.

"The West has really got a moral obligation to act where it can be argued there's a chance of saving civilian populations from the mass atrocity crimes that seem to follow very quickly when IS takes control of territory," Carr said on Wednesday.

Currently, Australian F/A-18 Hornets fly missions in war-torn Iraq but have not joined the U.S., Canada and other Arab nations in bombing IS positions in Syria. Earlier this week, the prime minister said a decision on whether or not Australia would proceed with aerial missions in Syria would be made in "a week or so."