WASHINGTON -- President Bush said today that the stepped-up violence in Baghdad and Basra represented a key test for the government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki and was "a defining moment in the history of a free Iraq."

He said Maliki was confronting criminal elements and, by sending Iraqi security forces into battle, demonstrating a willingness to apply "evenhanded justice" to Shiites and Sunnis.

The Iraqis, he said, "are in the lead -- this is a good test for them."

Bush spoke at a news conference in the White House East Room after conferring with Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, who took office recently with a pledge to begin withdrawing Australian combat troops from Iraq.

Rudd renewed an offer to provide training for Iraqi farmers facing similar dry-land agricultural issues as those tackled by Australian farmers.

The president and prime minister presented the two countries as being largely in agreement on foreign policy goals, particularly so with regard to Afghanistan. They are both heading next week to a NATO meeting in Bucharest, Romania, that is likely to focus on the alliance's commitment of troops to Afghanistan -- and Bush's effort to maintain the international force there.

"All of us must share the burden. We need to sign up to a common script," Rudd said, expressing continued support for his nation's Afghan deployment.

On Iraq, Bush said, one of the key questions he presented to Maliki when the prime minister took office was whether Maliki would confront criminal elements, either Shiite or Sunni, and use force if necessary to bring them under control.

"His answer was, 'Yes, I will,' " Bush said, adding that Maliki was now facing a "test for evenhanded government."

Singling out the port city of Basra as vulnerable to corruption, Bush said that routing out those seeking to rule by violence and corruption "will take awhile but it is a necessary part of a free society."

"Most people want to have normal lives. Most people don't want to be shaken down," Bush said, adding that challenging insurgents in Baghdad and Basra was Maliki's decision.

"It was his military planning," and Maliki's decision to send troops "from point A to point B," Bush said, adding: "The situation needed to be dealt with, and it's being dealt with."

james.gerstenzang@latimes.com