To deploy troops, aircraft
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
Raises terror threat to ‘High’
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.
Severed head photo
Sharrouf 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.
Arrest warrant
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.
Identified as top ISIS member
An 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.
Australia: 62% support Iraq involvement
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.
Suspends uranium trade
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
Ukraine aid
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.
Cargo plane comes under fire
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.
Australia to airlift weapons
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.
15 Australian militants dead
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.
‘150 Australians in Syria’
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.
Flees to Syria
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.