The ISIS brides debacle

Australia’s political leaders have turned the sensitive return of ISIS-affiliated citizens into a partisan circus, ignoring legal facts and fear-mongering, writes Dr Abul Rizvi.

OUR POLITICAL LEADERS in both major parties have secured the return of a small number of Australian citizens who left Australia to join the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) turned into a public information fiasco.

The Government’s simple and clear statement of the facts, plus some possible questions and answers, would have prevented much (but not all) of the current misinformation on this issue. The coalition took advantage of the information gap by peddling all sorts of outlandish claims that it should have known were false.

A little context

From 2015, large numbers of Australian citizens (men and women) left Australia to join ISIS. This also applied to citizens of the US, UK, Germany, France and similar countries who left to join ISIS in Syria and Iraq. according to Lowy Institute16.9 percent of Australian “foreign fighters” who joined ISIS were women.

Low finds This ‘The experiences of women who join ISIS are complex and it is often difficult to distinguish between voluntary or forced recruitment.’.

With the defeat of ISIS in 2019, some of the women left their country of citizenship and joined ISIS (also known as ISIS). ISIS brides) Detained indefinitely in refugee/detention camps in Syria. These refugee/detention centers, Global Coalition Against ISISAn organization of which Australia is a member. The legal basis for detention remains unclear until the individuals are charged and tried.

The international community has mainly adopted three different approaches to the repatriation of citizens who left to join ISIS.

Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan are two countries that are relatively open to repatriation of women based on the notion that they are victims of ISIS and have no authority to join the organization.

Relatively few ISIS women were seen returning to their countries in France, the UK, the US and Australia. Women with alleged ties to ISIS are seen as a threat to national security.

Germany repatriated the women because they were mothers of young children, and when they returned to Germany they were investigated and tried based on their specific role in the organization.

in 2014 Section 119.2 between Criminal Code Act 1995 Legislation has been passed making it a crime for an Australian to enter or remain in ISIS territory. Australian Federal Police in 2020 (AFP) has issued arrest warrants for various women held in concentration camps in Syria, and these orders will be carried out if the women return to Australia.

Additionally, Australia’s response to citizens who allegedly joined ISIS was to deprive them of dual citizenship. Citizenship of three Australian women revoked s36B between Australian Citizenship Act. Supreme Court in 2022 Alexander v Minister of Internal Affairs that this deprivation of citizenship violated the separation of powers Part III between Constitution. The relevant provisions were found to be invalid.

There were 66 Australian women and children in detention centers in Syria in 2019. That year, despite the former Minister of Internal Affairs Peter DuttonAustralian Government opposition to repatriation repatriated a group of children from these detention centers. New Labor Government in 2022 repatriated four more women and 13 children.

A woman repatriated in 2024 prisoner under Section 119.2 between Criminal Code Act To enter or remain in an ISIS-controlled area.

Save the Children Australia – Home Affairs Minister (2023) and subsequent appeal is the key case in Australia regarding the repatriation of Australian women and children held in Syrian camps.

This produced the following results in favor of the Government:

‘Australia does not have to repatriate women and children due to lack of control over the territory.’

It has been reported that since then, no attempt has been made by the Government to repatriate the women and children in Syrian detention camps.

According to evidence released in Senate Estimates this month, the Government became aware of attempts by these women to return to Australia without Government assistance earlier this year. This included applying for and securing Australian passports for children and citizenship by descent.

To date, two women and four children have managed to escape from the Syrian detention center where they are being held and cross to Australia. It is likely that other Australian citizen women and children will try to do the same.

Could the return of ISIS women and children be prevented?

Opposition Leader Susan Ley to have defended The government should have prevented these Australian women and children from returning to Australia (even though they were doing so through their own efforts). Without providing any details on how this could be legally achieved, Ley received support for this position from the usual sections of the media who shoot first and ask questions later.

Sky News reports:

‘A top-secret operation to bring Australian ISIS brides back home from northern Syria was first reported by The Australian newspaper on Tuesday; The headline revealed that more than a dozen women, children and young men would be evacuated from the camps and returned to New South Wales and Victoria before Christmas.’

But these media outlets fail to distinguish between a “repatriation” or “evacuation” organized and paid for by the Australian Government, and law enforcement operations planning on how these women and children will be tracked, investigated, and possibly charged if they return, using their own regulations.

The fundamental question that Ley and his media supporters fail to answer is that the Australian Government cannot prevent an Australian citizen from returning to Australia unless their citizenship is revoked.

Following the Supreme Court decisions in Alexander Benbrika, Section 36D between Citizenship Law Allows the minister to apply to a court for an order terminating a person’s Australian citizenship.

Law (Section 36C) It states that a court may order the termination of a person’s Australian citizenship if:

• the person is 14 years or older;
• the person is a dual citizen;
• the person has been convicted of one or more serious crimes;
• the court imposes a sentence of imprisonment for a period or periods totaling at least three years or more; And
• The conduct to which the offense relates is so serious and significant that it demonstrates a repudiation of the person’s allegiance to Australia.

Serious crimes specified in the law, Criminal Code and includes:

• Certain terrorist crimes, including violations of Enhanced Control Orders and Interim Control Orders;
• betrayal;
• espionage;
• foreign intervention;
• advocating rebellion;
• foreign attacks and military recruitment crimes; And
• some explosives and lethal device crimes.

In deciding whether a person’s conduct is so serious and significant that it indicates a repudiation of allegiance to Australia, the court must take into account the following:

• whether the person has engaged in conduct that demonstrates a rejection of the values, democratic beliefs, rights and freedoms that form the basis of Australian society;
• the degree, duration or scale of the person’s commitment or involvement in the behavior to which the offense relates;
• the intended scale of the conduct to which the conviction relates;
• the actual effect of the conduct to which the conviction relates; And
• whether the conduct causes or is intended to cause harm to or loss of human life.

The first obstacle to revoking the citizenship of these women will be to prove that they are dual citizens. Otherwise, cancellation becomes impossible. Did Ley and relevant media ask whether these women were dual citizens? Some may have been born in Australia and never held any other citizenship.

Assuming some have dual nationality, for the court to be successful in an application that meets the above requirements will require extensive evidence to be gathered as to whether these women were forced to leave Australia to join ISIS, what they did while abroad and the nature of the violent crimes they committed. This could not be easily done while the women were in Syria, or even after they left Syria.

The collection of this evidence will now likely be the focus of investigations by the AFP and others. While it may be a political advantage for Ley to argue that the Government should prevent these women from returning to Australia, it highlights either disrespect or ignorance of the law.

Dr Abul Rizvi Independent Australian columnist and a former Deputy Secretary of the Immigration Service. You can follow Abul on Twitter @RizviAbul.

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