Seven young Australians were intercepted at an airport attempting to travel to the Middle East “it seems to join terrorist groups over there”, Tony Abbott has said.
The prime minister cited a News Corp report about the alleged interceptions, which the immigration minister, Peter Dutton, said had occurred at Sydney airport on 12 August.
But the government initially refused to provide further details about the incident, citing operational considerations. There was some early confusion about the number of people.
The Daily Telegraph cited “a senior intelligence source” as saying five young Sydney men had triggered an alert at the airport last week as they tried to leave for the Middle East. Their initial flight was said to be to Malaysia, and they were carrying large amounts of cash, the report said.
“It was also confirmed that two of the five men attempted to leave again the next day but were again intercepted,” the report said, adding the passports were suspended and the group was under investigation by federal authorities.
During his opening remarks at a media conference on Thursday, Abbott said: “We have also seen overnight news that we have stopped at the airport seven young Australians who were planning to travel to the Middle East, it seems, to join terrorist groups over there.
“This indicates the continuing allure of this death cult. It shows the importance of the most vigorous action at home and abroad to disrupt, to degrade, to destroy this menace to the freedom and the security of the world.”
Asked to provide details, Abbott said he was not going to go into an operational matter. At a separate media conference, Dutton also declined to elaborate.
“I can say to you that there was an incident at Sydney international airport on 12 August and that follows a number of people who have been offloaded by the counter-terrorism unit officers, in particular, in Sydney and Melbourne over a period of time.
“We are concerned about the number of people presenting at airports, particularly younger people, who might be seeking to travel overseas for reasons that would horrify Australians and their parents and family and community, no doubt, as well.”
Dutton called a second media conference after parliamentary question time to release CCTV images and provide “a quick update with some details” in relation to two groups that sought to depart Sydney airport.
He said the first group were five men aged between their early 20s and early 30s who were intercepted by Australian Border Force officers. Counter-terorrism unit officers became involved and the five were interviewed and were not permitted to catch the flight.
“There was suspicion regarding their travel plans. Searches of the luggage revealed each individual had a large amount of cash, in the vicinity of $10,000 each,” he said.
“The five individuals re-attempted departure again the next day and they were again intercepted and obviously the Australian Border Force officers are working with the Australian federal police and with other agencies.”
Dutton said there was a second incident last weekend involving two men “related or connected with it’s believed the other five”. They were aged between the late 20s and early 30s.
“Again they were offloaded from a flight at Sydney international airport and they were interviewed,” he said. “The two again reattempted departure the next day but both again were intercepted.”
Dutton declined to say whether their passports had been confiscated after the first attempt. The term “offloading” can mean the people were in the departure area or on the plane, but their names were removed from the flight manifest.
The minister also declined to say whether the people were dual nationals.
The government is preparing to push ahead with a bill to strip dual nationals of their Australian citizenship if they are involved in terrorism, although the bill covers a range of other conduct including damage to commonwealth property.
The breadth of the bill has been questioned and several constitutional experts have warned the legislation could be vulnerable to a high court challenge. Dutton kept the door open to making changes to the legislation until after the government receives a report from the parliamentary joint committee on intelligence and security.
The committee report was due on Friday but has been delayed until 28 August. A committee inquiry was told the government would not release solicitor general’s advice on the legislation.
Dutton said the government wanted to deal with the bill when parliament returned in September.
“It’s important to point out that there is constitutional risk in any of these bills and we have sought to minimise that as best we can on the available advice,” he said.
“I have no doubt they [the committee] will make recommendations in relation to this bill, the government will consider that and respond at the appropriate time.”
The government is continuing community consultations on its citizenship discussion paper, which deals with more potential changes affecting Australian sole nationals who may be able to access citizenship elsewhere.
The former attorney general Philip Ruddock and the Liberal parliamentary secretary Concetta Fierravanti-Wells, who are leading those talks, said they had already received 2,500 responses to their online survey and 400 email submissions.
They said public forums were planned in capital cities across Australia in the next few weeks.
Ruddock emphasised a determination not to leave people stateless. “There is a convention that we [Australia] are party to and all of the measures that the government has proposed and we’ve been asked to look at, do not involve us breaching the obligation not to leave people stateless,” he said.
