Members of the family of suspected Islamic State militants who’re Australian nationals sit in a van heading to the airport in Damascus through the first repatriation operation of the yr, at Roj Camp in jap Syria, Monday, Feb. 16, 2026. Thirty-four Australian residents from 11 households departed the camp.
Baderkhan Ahmad/AP
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Baderkhan Ahmad/AP
MELBOURNE, Australia — The Australian authorities won’t repatriate from Syria a bunch of 34 girls and youngsters with alleged ties to the Islamic State group, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese mentioned Tuesday.
The ladies and youngsters from 11 households have been speculated to fly from the Syrian capital Damascus to Australia however Syrian authorities on Monday turned them again to Roj camp in northeast Syria due to procedural issues, officers mentioned.
Solely two teams of Australians have been repatriated with authorities assist from Syrian camps for the reason that fall of the Islamic State group in 2019. Different Australians have additionally returned with out authorities help.
Albanese wouldn’t touch upon a report that the most recent girls and youngsters had Australian passports.
“We’re offering completely no help and we’re not repatriating individuals,” Albanese instructed Australian Broadcasting Corp. in Melbourne.
“We have now no sympathy, frankly, for individuals who traveled abroad with a view to take part in what was an try to ascertain a caliphate to undermine, destroy, our lifestyle. And so, as my mom would say, ‘You make your mattress, you lie in it,'” Albanese added.
Albanese famous that the kid welfare-focused worldwide charity Save the Kids had failed to ascertain in Australia’s courts that the Australian authorities had a duty to repatriate residents from Syrian camps.
After the federal courtroom dominated within the authorities’s favor in 2024, Save the Kids Australia chief government Mat Tinkler argued the federal government had an ethical, if not authorized, obligation to repatriate households.
Albanese mentioned if the most recent group made their solution to Australia with out authorities assist, they might be charged.
It was an offense below Australian regulation to journey to the previous Islamic State stronghold of al-Raqqa province and not using a reputable purpose from 2014 to 2017. The utmost penalty was 10 years in jail.
“It is unlucky that kids are impacted by this as properly, however we’re not offering any help. And if anybody does handle to search out their manner again to Australia, then they’re going to face the total drive of the regulation, if any legal guidelines have been damaged,” Albanese added.
The final group of Australians to be repatriated from Syrian camps arrived in Sydney in October 2022.
They have been 4 moms, former companions of Islamic State supporters, and 13 kids.
Australian officers had assessed the group as essentially the most susceptible amongst 60 Australian girls and youngsters held in Roj camp, the federal government mentioned on the time.
Eight offspring of two slain Australian Islamic State fighters have been repatriated from Syria in 2019 by the conservative authorities that preceded Albanese’s center-left Labor Occasion administration.
The problem of Islamic State supporters resurfaced in Australia after the killings of 15 individuals at a Jewish pageant at Bondi Seaside on Dec. 14. The attackers have been allegedly impressed by IS.
