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10 Feb, 2014

Flees to Syria

Moves Country0 Comments

Media report that Sharrouf was able to flee to Syria via Malaysia in January by skirting a travel ban placed on him. He boarded a flight at Sydney airport using his brother’s passport in place of his own, which was confiscated by authorities. New South Wales premier Barry O’Farrell:

I have to say I think that immigration and the federal police and customs have been doing a magnificent job. But I look to see what caused what appears to have been a fairly major breakdown.

19 Jun, 2014

‘150 Australians in Syria’

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Foreign Minister Julie Bishop says that about 150 Australians are fighting in Syria:

In Syria, it seems that over a period of time they have moved from supporting more moderate opposition groups to the more extreme, and that includes this brutal extremist group ISIS

Radicalized fighters could pose a domestic threat:

We are concerned that Australians are working with them [ISIS], becoming radicalized, learning the terrorist trade, and if they come back to Australia, of course it poses a security threat. I’ve canceled a number of passports on the advice of intelligence agencies.

27 Aug, 2014

15 Australian militants dead

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Australia’s intelligence chief says at least 15 Australian fighters have been killed in Iraq and Syria, including two suicide bombers:

The draw of foreign fighters to Syria and Iraq is significant and includes more Australians than any other previous extremist conflicts put together

The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) believes the number of citizens posing a potential security threat has increased substantially:

ASIO believes there are about 60 or so Australians fighting with the two principal extremist Al-Qaeda derivatives, Jahabat-al-Nusra and the Islamic State in Syria or Iraq.

31 Aug, 2014

Australia to airlift weapons

Military Action0 Comments

The Royal Australian Air Force will deliver weapons to Kurdish fighters battling ISIS. Abbott says the decision to join Canada, Italy, the U.S., France and Britain is made to address a worsening ‘humanitarian crisis.’

Australia will join international partners to help the [anti-IS] forces in Iraq

The RAAF will provide C-130J Hercules and C-17A Globemaster aircraft. It has previously limited its air operations to humanitarian drops.

1 Sep, 2014

Cargo plane comes under fire

Military Action0 Comments

ISIS militants fire on a Royal Australian Air Force Hercules C-130 cargo plane with small arms and heavy machineguns during an airdrop over the Shiite Turkmen town of Amerli in northern Iraq. With the drop taking place at night, the rebels fire by noise rather than sight as the darkened planes flew below 300 meters to make the delivery of 15 bundles of water, biscuits and hygiene packs. U.S. fighter jets flying top cover respond with maximum force after being guided in by a high-flying U.S. Air Force J-Star spy plane.

3 Sep, 2014

Ukraine aid

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Abbott says Australia is considering ‘non-lethal’ military action and humanitarian assistance in the Ukraine:

… Ukraine continues to be subject to active destabilisation and indeed outright invasion from Russia, a country it has never ever sought to harm … along with our European partners and allies, we are considering short-term humanitarian assistance and non-lethal military assistance to Ukraine and in the medium term … we are considering civil and military capacity building assistance to that country.

Suspends uranium trade

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Abbott announces that uranium trade with Russia is ruled out until further notice due to its actions in the Ukraine, several days after the government announces other sanctions including restrictions on investment, travel, and access by Russian banks to Australian capital markets.

Australia has no intention of selling uranium to a country which is so obviously in breach of international law as Russia currently is

9 Sep, 2014

Australia: 62% support Iraq involvement

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A poll of 1207 Australians for The Australian newspaper finds that 62% of voters support the action taken so far in Iraq by the Abbott government, consisting of humanitarian aid drops of food, water and hygiene packs by the Royal Australian Air Force, as well as shipments of weapons and ammunition to anti-ISIS groups. It finds that 25% of voters are opposed and 13% are uncommitted. The Newspoll survey finds that 70% of men support the action and 18% oppose it, while among women the split is 54% in favour and 31% against. It finds that 75% of supporters of Abbott’s Liberal-National coalition favour the government’s action while 19% oppose it. It says that 53% of Labour opposition voters support the action and 31% oppose it.

Identified as top ISIS member

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isis-mohammad-baryaleiAn investigation by ABC’s 7:30 program identifies 33-year-old Mohammad Ali Baryalei from Sydney as Australia’s most senior ISIS member. Baryalei is from an aristocratic Afghan family that came to Australia as refugees as a child, and has worked as a security guard in King’s Cross and made a brief appearance as an extra on the true crime show Underbelly. Police say that in 2013 he traveled to Syria to fight with extremist groups and has since become the top recruiter of Australians to ISIS, involved in its operational command in Syria and Iraq as a facilitator for Australians traveling to join jihad. Baryalei in an intercepted phone call with his handler in Sydney:

Four brothers coming this week. They are leaving Australia. Going to try to get them by the weekend. Abu Qaqa is the tall one that was doing Dawah with you. … The brothers yesterday, they were crying, affected, none of them wanted to stay in this country one second.

Arrest warrant

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An arrest warrant is issued for Baryalei after he is identified by ABC’s 7:30 investigative program as Australia’s most senior ISIS member. Authorities say he has used a trusted position in ISIS operational command to funnel more than half of the 60 Australians currently fighting in the wars in Iraq and Syria, including senior fighters Mohamed Elomar and Khaled Sharrouf. They say he has also facilitated the recruitment of at least two 17-year-old boys and at least seven Australians who have gone on to be killed in Syria and Iraq. Federal police spokesman:

Should Baryalei return to Australia, this warrant authorises law enforcement to arrest him immediately.

11 Sep, 2014

Severed head photo

Terror Incident0 Comments

isis-khaled-sharrouf-photoSharrouf tweets a photo apparently showing his seven-year-old son holding the decapitated head of a Syrian soldier. Caption:

That’s my boy

In the photographs featuring Sharrouf and his son the heads are blackened and bloated, having been dead for a week.

12 Sep, 2014

Raises terror threat to ‘High’

Terror Incident0 Comments

Australia raises its terror threat level to High from Medium at the advice of the Australian Secret Intelligence Organization (ASIO), indicating that an attack is considered ‘likely’ but not imminent.

Abbott:

We have no specific intelligence of a particular plot. What we do have is that there are people with the intent and capability to mount attacks.

14 Sep, 2014

To deploy troops, aircraft

Military Action0 Comments

Abbott announces that Australia will deploy 400 air force personnel and 200 special forces troops to the United Arab Emirates where they will be based at a U.S. facility in preparation for possible military operations against ISIS. Eight Super Hornet jets, an EWAC (Early Warning and Control) plane and a tanker aircraft for aerial refueling will be deployed. He tells reporters in the Northern Territory capital city Darwin that the government considers the deployment ‘prudent and proportionate’, but that there there are ‘obviously further decisions to be taken’ before Australian forces commit to combat action.

I have to warn the Australian people that should this preparation and deployment extend into combat operations, that this could go on for quite some time

18 Sep, 2014

15 arrests in beheading plot

Terror Incident0 Comments

Australian counterterror officials arrest 15 people alleged to be involved in a plot to carry out beheadings of random people kidnapped off the streets in Sydney and Brisbane. The raids of more than a dozen properties across 12 Sydney suburbs by around 800 federal and state police officers are Australia’s biggest ever operation.

Sydney man charged with terror conspiracy

Terror Incident0 Comments

22-year-old Omarjan Azari is accused in Sydney’s Central Local Court of conspiring to act in preparation or plan a terrorist act or acts. He is one of 15 mostly Afghan Australians arrested earlier Thursday in an alleged plot to carry out executions in Sydney and Brisbane. The court is told the charges against Azari stem from a single phone call intercepted earlier in the week. Commonwealth prosecutor Michael Allnutt:

It’s been an immediate reaction to a clear, imperative danger

He does not apply for bail, and the case is adjourned until November 13.

Woman threatened with arrest in iPhone 6 queue

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A 24-year-old international student from China, identified as Anna, breaks into tears as she leaves the queue for the iPhone 6 at Apple’s flagship Sydney store around 10 a.m. Friday local time (8 p.m. Thursday EDT) after police say that she may be arrested if she does not remove herself from the George Street area for six hours. She has been queuing for over 24 hours to buy two 4.7-inch handsets, but became worried that she may not reach the front of the line as the number of customers in front of her rose to 180 from about 80 overnight after people joined their friends in the queue. She stepped out of line several times to see if someone would sell her a handset at an affordable price, after people in the queue offered to sell her the phones at inflated rates including more than twice the price. She says it is unfair that ‘true’ Apple fans like her miss out, implying others are trying to profit from the high demand for the product:

I just feel so excited by the iPhone but the shop did nothing [to stop people pushing in]. It’s a waste of my heart, waste of my love.

She says Apple could have allocated number cards to ensure people could not jump in front of those who had been waiting longer.

Top ISIS member connected to plot

Terror Incident0 Comments

Court documents connect the man believed to be Australia’s most senior ISIS member to the alleged plot to kidnap and execute members of the public in Sydney and Brisbane. Court documents show that 22-year-old Omarjan Azari of Guildford, Sydney, the first person to be charged in connection with the plot, is alleged to have conspired with Mohammad Ali Baryalei, who has been identified in an arrest warrant as the top recruiter for ISIS of Australians fighting for the group in Iraq and Syria.

‘Not just suspicion’

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Abbott says the participants in the alleged ISIS plot to kidnap and kill Australian members of the public showed clear intent to commit ‘demonstration’ beheadings in Sydney:

The exhortations, quite direct exhortations, were coming from an Australian who is apparently quite senior in ISIL to networks of support back in Australia to conduct demonstration killings here in this country. So this is not just suspicion, this is intent, and that’s why the police and security agencies decided to act in the way they have.

A$9 million funds investigated

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Australian Federal Police investigate the Bisotel Rieh money-remittance provider after financial intelligence and compliance agency AUSTRAC suspends the company for failing to declare A$9 million (US$8.08 million) that it sent overseas between January and August. A company director, Damour Sharrouf, is understood to be Khaled Sharrouf’s sister while the other company director is Ahmed Alwash, believed to be Damour Sharrouf’s husband. The investigation concerns transfers of funds to individuals in Malaysia. Staff are said to admit that it ‘actively smuggles’ money from Turkey into Lebanon. AUSTRAC chief executive John Schmidt:

The figures don’t appear to match. It’s a fairly big difference in a short space of time. We are satisfied that the continued registration … may involve a significant financing-of-terrorism risk.

23 Oct, 2014

Minister seeks mandatory detention

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Sources say Morrison is suggesting implementing mandatory quarantine for anyone arriving in Australia from Ebola-affected west Africa. He has said that a hard-line quarantine approach could be best run by being absorbed under his immigration portfolio and handled by the Operation Sovereign Borders team, which is in place to stop people smuggling into the country. A minister tells ABC radio:

[Morrison is] annoying everyone on the National Security Committee because he’s not across all the facts on Ebola. He doesn’t have access to what the chief medical officer is advising the Health Minister.