Dangerous Victorian terrorist Abdul Nacer Benbrika’s citizenship cancelled

Abdul Nacer Benbrika’s citizenship has been cancelled, as the terrorist fights for release after his jail sentence expired this month.

Abdul Nacer Benbrika’s citizenship has been cancelled. Picture: Kym Smith

The federal government cancelled terrorist Abdul Nacer Benbrika’s citizenship on Friday, in a secondary move to protect the Australian community if they fail to keep him in jail after his sentence expired this month.

Benbrika served 15 years behind bars for his role as the spiritual leader of Australia’s largest terror network.

His sentence expired on November 5 and he is kept in jail due to an interim detention order from the Victorian Supreme Court while the government seeks a continuing detention order of three years.

Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton said Benbrika was the first person to lose their citizenship in Australia under the counter-terror laws.

He said the decision was made because of “the risk that we deem Benbrika still poses to the Australian public”.

The government amended the Citizenship Cessation bill on September 3 to apply to Australian citizens convicted of terrorism acts from May 2003.

The act previously applied to acts committed after December 2015.

The amendment came into effect on September 18, nine days after the legal proceedings were issued in the Supreme Court to issue a continuing detention order against Benbrika.

Benbrika’s barrister Brian Walters QC told the court he was concerned about the use of the legislation in the case against Benbrika.

The terrorist’s sentence expired earlier this month.

Abdul Nacer Benbrika was behind bars for 15 years.

“(My client) has now completed his sentence, he shouldn’t be subjected to this,” Mr Walters said. “We are concerned that this power is now being deployed against our client in a way that appears to affect the argument in the case.”

Mr Walters said he was notified about the decision to cancel Benbrika’s citizenship on Sunday afternoon.

Benbrika now holds an ex-citizen visa which could be cancelled on character grounds.

“That visa is liable to be cancelled by the minister at any time,” Mr Walters said.

He said Benbrika would then be taken into immigration detention and liable to be deported back to Algeria at any time.

Rowena Orr QC said Benbrika would not be taken to immigration detention while he was still in jail on the interim detention order.

“The effect of (the decision) is to place the defendant on a visa rather than have status as an Australian citizen,” she said.

She said the decision showed the “availability of a different path” to a less restrictive measure of preventing an unidentifiable risk.

Abdul Naser Benbrika is escorted from the Victorian Supreme Court after his conviction and sentencing on terrorism charges.

“(We say it is) not an effective measure for addressing the risk posed by the defendant,” Ms Orr said.

She said there would be a lack of reach and oversight by Australian authorities if Benbrika was deported to his home country and there was a risk of him committing offences from overseas.

Benbrika has 90 days to appeal the decision to revoke his citizenship.

The Supreme Court trial over a continuing detention order starts Monday.

Benbrika was convicted over terror plots involving two cells, one in Sydney and the other in Melbourne, and would have targeted the 2005 AFL grand final at the MCG, Crown casino during the Grand Prix weekend in 2006 and Sydney’s Lucas Heights nuclear reactor.

Benbrika, an Algerian immigrant and former aviation engineer, was one of 17 caught up in what at the time was Australia’s largest counter-terrorism investigation, Operation Pendennis. He was arrested in 2005 and refused parole in 2017 by former Attorney-General George Brandis.