Legal action underway to force Albanese Government to bring home IS families from Syria

Save the Children has launched legal action to force the Albanese government to bring home Australian women and children from secure camps for IS-linked families in Syria.

Australian women and children at al-Roj camp in northeastern Syria. Picture: Ellen Whinnett

Legal action has begun in a bid to force the Albanese government to repatriate Australian women and children detained for four years in a Syrian detention camp for families linked to Islamic State.

Charity Save the Children Australia is running the case on behalf of families locked up indefinitely without charge since the fall of Islamic State in March 2019.

The barristers working on the case include Emrys Nekvapil SC and Peter Morrissey SC.

While legal action has been considered for some time, the families were hopeful the government would bring them back following the repatriation of four women and their 13 children in October.

However, the government ­appeared spooked by intense media coverage of the repatriation of the four families, who were considered particularly vulnerable and who posed a low ­security risk, and failed to make a decision on when to bring the ­remaining Australians home.

The Australian women are the wives and widows of Islamic State fighters who were either killed in Syria, or are held in jails in Syria or Iraq. At least 41 Australian women and children are in al-Roj, and it is thought about 20 of them would be represented by Save the Children, which has assembled a team of KCs, junior barristers and a national law firm, all working pro bono.

It is believed Australian officials may have been in Syria in ­recent weeks, and the matter was discussed at the highest levels of government last week, but no firm commitment to repatriate any further women or children was made.

Save the Children will seek to use a writ of habeas corpus legal argument, which requires prisoners to be brought before a court to test if their detention is lawful.

“Save the Children has been instructed to act as litigation guardian for a group of innocent Australian children and their mothers who are seeking repatriation from camps in northeast Syria,’’ the charity’s Australian chief executive, Mat Tinkler, said.

Save the Children CEO Mat Tinkler made the journey from Melbourne to the camp at al-Roj in Syria to prove it was safe enough for officials to visit.

A writ is due to be lodged shortly, although the charity would not reveal which court would run the case.

“We have assembled a high-calibre legal team to prepare an application for a writ of habeas corpus on behalf of these Australians, who have now been trapped in the camps for more than four years,’’ Mr Tinkler said.

“Save the Children has been encouraging the Australian government at every available opportunity to bring home the remaining Australians, and working to avoid the prospect of legal action.

“However, the families have become increasingly desperate, as the risks to their children’s health and safety grow with every day that passes. While litigation is a last resort, continued government inaction means the filing of the case is now imminent.

“Humanitarian, international legal and national security experts agree that the best course for the government is to urgently repatriate the Australian women and children from these camps.

“All those involved in the legal action are prepared to see it through to bring them home.”

The Western-aligned Syrian Defence Forces, which is holding the women and about 55,000 other foreign national women and children in secure camps in northeastern Syria, has been pleading with foreign governments to take responsibility for their citizens and repatriate them.

The Morrison government returned two groups of mainly orphaned children in 2019 then refused any further repatriations.

The Albanese government brought the four family groups in October, charging one woman with entering the proscribed city of Raqqa.

Similar habeas corpus cases have been run in Europe and the UK with mixed results.

In a case in Canada earlier this year, the courts ruled the Canadian government was obliged to take steps to repatriate citizens from Syria.