Tony Burke has ‘complete confidence’ intelligence agencies know ISIS families’ states of mind

Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke says ASIO and other security agencies have detailed knowledge of the 11 so-called ISIS brides and their 23 children who were attempting to return to Australia, which had allowed them to identify that one woman posed a much bigger risk to national security.

He revealed the woman temporarily barred from returning to Australia from Syria may hold a dual citizenship but it’s unlikely her country of birth would recognise it.

But he said the legal threshold needed to refuse Australian citizens passports – a key argument from the Opposition in terms of government failings – was far higher.

The group of 34 escaped from the Al Roj camp in north-eastern Syria last week but were turned around by Syrian authorities after making it only about 50km.

They have been issued Australian travel permits, although these are reportedly single-entry provisional travel documents rather than full passports, but Mr Burke revealed last week that one of the women was subject to a temporary exclusion order, meaning she cannot return for a two-year period without seeking permission.

He said on Sunday that if intelligence agencies found new information that meant any others among the group should also be subject to temporary exclusion orders, “they’d be issued straight away”.

“The cohort is not consistent. There are very different people within that cohort with different histories and different states of mind,” he told ABC’s Insiders.

“They are quite different, but our agencies have been following them, and following them for a long time.

“The fact that one person has been pulled out for saying that person meets the threshold for a temporary exclusion order is because, quite specifically, of what we know about that individual.

“I can give the complete confidence to the Australian community: we know the different individuals. We know the state of mind and the effective ideology of different individuals.”

He said that the woman had come to Australia and subsequently received citizenship when John Howard was prime minister, and left for Syria while Tony Abbott was Prime Minister.

But “given the country that she came from … I’m not sure that they would actually recognise that (dual) citizenship”, although he refused to name the country.

The rest of the women “overwhelmingly” had been born in Australia, he said.

Shadow defence minister James Paterson questioned why the government hadn’t used provisions of the Passports Act to refuse to issue travel documents to the group.

“If they have advice to apply for a TEO, then they should also have the same advice to deny a passport,” he told Sky News.

“But frankly, if they think the law is not adequate, if they think there is not enough room for them to deny passports, well then we have already said we will work with them to strengthen the law.”

But Mr Burke said the legal threshold for a temporary exclusion order was lower than for refusing a passport because it wasn’t a permanent decision.

He said ASIO hadn’t provided any advice that a refusal under the Passport Act could be made, and the agency was “conscious of its specific legislative responsibilities”.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the women would face the full force of the law if they did manage to return to Australia, reiterating that the Government was doing nothing to actively facilitate that return.

“I’m certainly not in contact with them, nor is anyone from the Australian Government,” he told Sky News.

“Australian citizens have rights, and they also have responsibilities, and those responsibilities mean that the Australian Government, like with anyone else, will apply the full force of the law to anyone who has broken any Australian laws.”

Senator Paterson said that “every one of them should face charges if they ever find their way back home” but the Government’s priority should be on keeping them offshore.