Nationals Senator Matt Canavan has doubled down on a tweet that has been labelled insensitive in the wake of the fall of the Afghan government.

He tweeted, “Does anyone know if the Taliban will sign up to net zero?”

The Taliban has seized control of the country after capturing the capital city, Kabul.

He said he knew the comment was going to be divisive.

“The comment was meant to provoke, because I don’t think we are going to honour those Australians who have sacrificed if we don’t front up to the disaster this has been,” he told Scott Emerson.

“Part of the reason it is an absolute debacle is because we have been focussed on so many other issues, and taken our eyes off the main game.”

He said he was “not going to apologise for trying to wake people up”.

“We have to wake up to ourselves really soon, so I am trying to wake people up, to wake up to the real threats and issues that face us, and they are not going to be solved by us trying to change the temperature of the globe.

“They are going to be solved by us re-industrialising our nation, and improving our defence, that’s what we have go to focus on now.”

Press PLAY below to hear his response and why Australians need to “wake up” 

Earlier, former veterans’ affairs minister Darren Chester  slammed the tweet as insensitive.

The Taliban have taken control of the Presidential Palace in Kabul and the Afghan president has fled to another country.

Mr Chester told Deborah Knight he’s personally expressed his displeasure.

“I think that tweet was offensive, disrespectful and I thought it was totally lacking in compassion.”

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