Sydney (AFP) - Dual nationals
who help terrorists could automatically lose their Australian
citizenship even if they have never stepped foot out of the country
under new laws introduced to parliament on Wednesday.
Immigration
Minister Peter Dutton introduced legislation to amend the Citizenship
Act as fears grow about the number of Australians fighting with jihadist
groups and concern about the threat at home from radicalised
individuals.
It specifies
three mechanisms and a series of grounds which could lead to an
Australian, even if born in the country, being stripped of their
citizenship.
They include a person convicted of a terrorist act by an Australian court and anyone found to be engaged in terrorist activity.
It
also extends an existing provision covering fighting for the armed
forces of a country at war with Australia to also cover fighting for a
terrorist organisation.
There are currently 20 such groups on Canberra's list of terrorist organisations.
"This bill emphasises the
central importance of allegiances to Australia into the concept of
citizenship," Dutton said in introducing the legislation.
"Citizenship
is to be treasured. It's a common bond that unites us all, whether we
were born here or chose to make Australia our home.
"The world has changed so our laws should change accordingly," he added.
Dutton
said citizenship could be lost for not only engaging in terrorist acts
but providing or receiving training linked to terrorism, as well as
recruiting or financing for jihadist groups.
But
he stressed that noone would lose citizenship unless they were also a
national of another country as this would render them stateless and be
in violation of the UN Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness.
"Automatic
loss of citizenship will be triggered whether the conduct takes place
inside or outside Australia," he added. "The loss of citizenship will be
immediate, upon the person engaging in the relevant conduct."It was initially planned that Dutton himself would have the power to take away citizenship, without trial or conviction, but this has been dumped after advice that it would be unconstitutional.
He will now only inform people of their fate after advice from security agencies, with anyone targeted having an automatic right of review to the Federal and High courts.
The laws will be examined by a parliamentary committee on intelligence and security with the Labor opposition generally supportive of the changes.
The
committee will also look into whether the legislation, if passed, could
be retrospectively applied to take into account dual nationals
currently in jail on terrorism convictions.
About
half of the 120 Australians that the government believes are fighting
with jihadist groups in the Middle East are dual nationals, Canberra has
said.
No comments:
Post a Comment