Melbourne woman arrested for allegedly trying to recruit for Islamic State

Counter-terrorism officers have arrested a Melbourne woman they say tried to recruit a person to fight with the terror group.

AFP counter-terror police have arrested a woman in Melbourne.

A 17-year-old Melbourne girl allegedly connected with an Australian Islamic State fighter in Syria and provided him with help and is accused of trying to recruit another person to the group a year later.

Now aged 22, Hadasha Sa’adat Khan was arrested by counter-terrorism officers at her home in Hallam, in Melbourne’s southeast, on Tuesday.

According to police, Ms Sa’adat Khan was still a youth when she allegedly became involved with the Islamic State.

She allegedly became associated with a person promoting or directing the activities of Islamic State between February and March 2015, court documents said.

The Joint Counter Terrorism Team have said it will be alleged that the person involved is an Australian man who was fighting with the group in Syria at the time.

Ms Sa’adat Khan is also accused of recruiting someone to the terror group and performing services for a person intending to engage in hostile activity overseas in June 2016.

If convicted, she faces the possibility of life imprisonment.

She appeared in the Melbourne Magistrates Court on Tuesday afternoon, but did not apply for bail.

She had laughed nervously in court, where she wore a black hijab that she adjusted to hide her face from public view.

The court heard it was her first time in custody and was vulnerable because of her age.

She is said to require halal food while in custody.

Ms Sa’adat was remanded in custody and is due to reappear in the court on June 16 for a committal mention.

The identities of the two people have not been revealed in court.

The Australian Federal Police said the investigation has not identified any current or impending threat to the community.

More than 230 Australians have travelled to Syria and Iraq during the conflict, many of whom joined Islamic State.

Several of them came Melbourne’s southeastern suburbs during the Islamic State’s peak in 2014 and 2015.

Among them was Neil Prakash – the notorious terror recruiter linked to terrorism plots in Australia and overseas – who has been imprisoned in Turkey and sought for questioning by several countries, including Australia.

The federal government has previously said he has lost his Australian citizenship.

Others from Melbourne’s southeast who joined the group include former male model Sharky Jama, believed to have been killed in Iraq in 2015, and Irfaan Hussein, who died the same year.

Hussein was also friends with Numan Haider, who was 18 when he was shot dead while carrying out the first lone-wolf attack on Australian soil. He had attempted to stab two counter-terrorism officers outside the Endeavour Hills Police Station in September 2014.

Additional reporting: AAP