Australia proposes stripping extremists of citizenship

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Australia revealed plans on Thursday to increase government powers to strip citizenship from extremists, even if they are native-born Australians.

Acting after a series of recent attacks in the country, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said his government needed expanded powers to withdraw citizenship from anyone found guilty of terrorist activity.

"People who commit acts of terrorism have rejected absolutely everything that this country stands for," Morrison said in a press conference.

"This is something that can't be tolerated, and for those who would engage in this sort of activity, and they have citizenship elsewhere, or we have reason to believe they do, they can go."

Australia's Prime Minister Scott Morrison speaks in Darwin, November 16, 2018. /VCG Photo

Australia's current Citizenship Act allows authorities to revoke citizenship from people jailed for six years or more for terrorist activities, but only if they are already dual nationals.

Morrison called these limits unrealistic and said the law should be broadened so that anyone convicted of a terrorist offense, even native-born Australians, could be expelled if they could reasonably be expected to gain citizenship in another country through their parents or grandparents.

The conservative government will submit legislation to amend the Citizenship Act to enshrine these new powers by the end of the year, he said.

The legislation will also seek the power to impose temporary exclusion orders on so-called "returned foreign fighters," Australian citizens who travel to conflict zones to fight alongside extremist groups.

The provision would allow Australia to bar the return of a citizen for up to two years, and to impose strict conditions on their activities once they come home.

A box of flowers is seen at the site a day after where a man killed one person in what authorities said was a terrorist attack in central Melbourne, November 10, 2018. /VCG Photo

Morrison's action came two days after police in Melbourne arrested three Australian-born men of Turkish descent for allegedly plotting a mass shooting in the city.

Less than two weeks earlier, another man who was born in Somalia but came to Australia with his family as a child, went on a stabbing rampage in Melbourne, killing one man and wounding two others before being fatally shot by police.

Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton said there had been seven terror-related attacks in Australia since 2014, while authorities had thwarted 15 other plots.

Nine convicted terrorists have already had their citizenship revoked under existing law, he added.

"We assess there are around 50 Australian dual citizens who may be eligible to lose citizenship under the current provisions, and even more with the changes we are announcing today," Dutton said.

Source(s): AFP