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Australia has declined to assist in the return of its citizens with links to the Islamic State group, after an attempt by 34 Australian women and children to leave a detention camp in Syria ended in failure.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told the national broadcaster ABC that the government would not repatriate individuals associated with ISIS.
“If you make your bed, you lie in it,” Albanese said.
The prime minister’s remarks followed reports that Syrian authorities turned back the group after they left the Al-Roj detention camp in northeastern Syria with plans to travel through Damascus and eventually return to Australia.
Rashid Omar, a camp official, said two male relatives of the detainees had arrived at the camp seeking custody of their family members. According to Omar, the men presented temporary Australian passports and claimed they had coordinated with Syrian authorities for the transfer.
“Based on this, we agreed and transported them by bus. However, shortly after leaving, Damascus informed us that there are no coordination made so they had to turn back to the camp,” Omar said. He added that camp officials “don’t understand why they were sent back despite already holding temporary Australian passports.”
Asked whether the detainees possessed Australian passports, Albanese said he could not confirm “anything about individuals.”
“What I can say is that we’re providing absolutely no support and we are not repatriating people,” Albanese told ABC Radio. “We have no sympathy, frankly, for people who travelled overseas in order to participate in what was an attempt to establish a caliphate to undermine, destroy our way of life.”
The reason Syrian authorities denied the group passage remains unclear, and it is not known whether another attempt to leave the camp will be made.
Pressure has grown on countries including Australia, the United States and the United Kingdom to bring home thousands of nationals — primarily women and children — who have remained in Syrian detention camps since the fall of ISIS’ territorial control more than five years ago.
Human rights organizations, including Amnesty International, have warned of abuses in the camps, alleging torture, gender-based violence and forced disappearances. Many detainees, advocacy groups say, were either trafficked into ISIS-held territory or born during the so-called caliphate.
Some governments have cautiously begun repatriation efforts, though progress has been slow amid security concerns and domestic political opposition.
Australia previously repatriated groups of women and children in 2019 and 2022. Last year, two Australian women and four children reportedly left Syria independently and returned via Lebanon without government assistance.
In a statement, an Australian government spokesperson reaffirmed Canberra’s position.
“Australia is not and will not repatriate people from Syria.”
“Our security agencies have been monitoring – and continue to monitor – the situation in Syria to ensure they are prepared for any Australians seeking to return to Australia,” the spokesperson said.
“People in this cohort need to know that if they have committed a crime and if they return to Australia they will be met with the full force of the law.”
Advocacy groups continue to urge a different approach. Save the Children Australia, which has previously campaigned for repatriation and unsuccessfully pursued legal action in 2023 to compel the government to act, said it was not involved in the recent attempt but renewed its call for children to be brought home.
“These innocent children have already lost years of their childhood, and deserve the chance to rebuild their lives in safety at home, and to reintegrate into the Australian way of life,” said Save the Children Australia CEO Mat Tinkler.
The situation has been further complicated by political changes in Syria following the collapse of former president Bashar al-Assad in 2024. The country’s new leadership has sought to expand control over areas previously held by Kurdish-led forces, including detention camps.
Last month, a group of United Nations experts urged “over 50 countries to urgently repatriate, rehabilitate and reintegrate the thousands of foreign nationals in detention, while ensuring accountability in line with international law.”
Separately, U.S. officials said more than 5,700 adult male ISIS fighters were transferred from Syrian detention to Iraqi custody this week. UN experts have criticized the move, raising concerns about due process and detention conditions.
SOURCE: CNN