Simon Atkinson,MelbourneAnd
Helene Livingstone
Thirteen women and children linked to the Islamic State (IS) group have returned home to Australia after spending years in a Syrian detention camp.
The group, who had been living in the al-Roj detention camp since 2019, had been the subject of heated political debate in Australia, with the government saying it would not provide them with any assistance to return.
Three women and eight children – believed to be members of the same family – landed in Melbourne on Thursday afternoon, while another woman and her child arrived in Sydney shortly after.
Police said some of the women would be arrested and charged after their arrival, while others would be subject to “continuing investigation.”
The group arriving in Melbourne is believed to consist of grandmother Kawsar Abbas, her adult daughters Zeinab and Zahra Ahmed, and their eight children.
Abbas is married to Mohammad Ahmad, who ran a charity that Australian police say was used to send money to ISIS. He denied the accusation in an interview with national broadcaster ABC in 2019, after it found him in a prison in Syria.
The woman arriving in Sydney was identified by local media as Janai Safar. She is accompanied by her nine-year-old son, born in Syria.
Safar is a former nursing student from Sydney who traveled to Syria in 2015 and is believed to have married an ISIS fighter.
In an interview with the Australian newspaper in 2019, she said it was her own decision to go to Syria and that she did not want to return to Australia for fear of being arrested and having her child taken away.
On Wednesday, Police Commissioner Krissy Barratt confirmed some of the women would be arrested and charged. Potential charges included terrorism offenses such as entering or remaining in declared areas, and crimes against humanity offenses such as engaging in the slave trade.
This group of 13 people is part of a larger cohort of 34 people believed to include wives, widows and children of ISIS fighters who left the camp in February, but returned for “technical reasons” the Australian government refusing to officially repatriate them.
One member of the cohort was banned from returning to Australia earlier this year, when the government issued a “temporary exclusion order”, meaning they cannot return for two years. This person is not part of the group that landed on Thursday.
Boarding a connecting flight to Melbourne at Doha, the women told a reporter from national broadcaster ABC they were excited to return home, saying Australia was “like paradise” to them.
“We just want our kids to be safe. It was like hell [in Syria] for them,” one said.
Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke said Australia learned the women were due to return home on Wednesday, when tickets were booked.
“These are people who made the horrible choice to join a dangerous terrorist organization and place their children in an unspeakable situation,” he told reporters, adding that “all members of this cohort who have committed crimes can expect to face the full force of the law.”
The government had been preparing for the group’s return since 2014, Burke said, with “long-standing plans” to “manage and monitor them.”
The head of Australia’s intelligence agency, Mike Burgess, said he was not “immediately concerned” about the group’s return but “they will attract our attention as you would expect.”
Victorian Premier Jacinta Allen said children returning to her state would be “invited to undertake programs to counter violent extremism.” It’s appropriate.”