Philip Ruddock (Berowra, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

This report was tabled yesterday, and it is the review by the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security of the relisting of the Hamas Brigades; the PKK, which is known as the Kurdistan Workers Party; the organisation Lashkar-e-Tayyiba; and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. I speak to this report in the absence of the chair, Arch Bevis, who is away with a delegation. I participated in the deliberations and I speak to the report, and I take the opportunity of thanking my colleagues and also the secretariat staff for their work in the preparation of this report.

The recommendations were that all four organisations, which have been found to be terrorist organisations under the Criminal Code, should not be the subject of a disallowance resolution by either this or the other house of parliament. In that context, I speak to recommendations which reflect the view that the committee formed: that each of these organisations remain listed terrorist organisations. As part of the process, I note that proscription of terrorist organisations requires a very high level of examination and cooperation, and it crosses political boundaries.

Members would note on page 4 of the report that the Prime Minister wrote to the premiers of states and to all chief ministers advising of the intention to relist each of these organisations, and positive replies were received in each case. In that context, I note that the matters were largely without contest except in two matters. One involved the Hamas Brigades, where there was contest—an assumption by one of the people who wanted to give evidence to the committee, a Mr Judeh, who came to a view that if you found information on the internet, that was all that was necessary to form conclusions. I just wish to say that he contested much of the information presented by ASIO on the basis that it was information published on the internet, and he presented voluminous amounts of his own open source data—equally collected from the internet—and because they were juxtaposed he came to a view that proscription should not occur. I would simply make the point, and it was made in the committee’s conclusions, that whilst statements of reasons often refer to open source documents, importantly they state that information provided while publicly available has been corroborated by classified information. This was a matter that the committee tested in coming to a view that the Hamas Brigades should be still listed as a terrorist organisation. I note that that is not the whole of the Hamas organisation that is proscribed.

The other matter in which there was some contest was in relation to the PKK—the Kurdistan Workers Party. There were people who represented Kurdish organisations in Australia, and they put to us some of their concerns about relisting of that organisation. The committee in its report makes the very strong point that the relisting of the PKK is in no way meant as a comment on Australians of Kurdish descent. It is of concern to the committee to have Australians of Kurdish background believing that they are in a position of being lesser citizens or persecuted, but the committee fully accepts that, while members of the Kurdish community may wholeheartedly support the PKK’s political and ideological objectives, they oppose terrorism. In fact, when we had the witnesses before us, we examined that issue at some length, because we did identify, from the material that was available to us, that the PKK was an organisation that had been involved in violent acts in the period 2006-09, and that is outlined in the report.

The issue that arose in some of the evidence given before us was whether the PKK may now be changing its modus operandi. That was an issue of considerable interest to us. The evidence that we received, particularly from ASIO, was that there is still a large chunk of the organisation that adheres to the use of terrorist activities to get its point across, and its ideology. In our discussion with the security organisation, it was clear that they would reconsider the listing of this organisation if it substantially changed its modus operandi. There were some interesting developments that we canvassed in the report involving the pardoning of certain people in relation to offences that had occurred in Turkey. From our perspective, while engagement in peace and mediation was useful, until there is clear evidence that the organisation has changed, that should not be a matter that would influence our judgment.

I want to conclude by simply saying that, in relation to this question as to whether or not a state such as Turkey may have reacted in a way which those who engage in terrorism believe might justify that activity, in my examination of some of the representatives of Kurdish organisations, I put this proposition. I referred to the statement of reasons and I said that it lists conduct from 13 September 1996 until March this year, conduct which involves what the Attorney-General has described as terrorist activity. I said, ‘It seems to me that you are not contesting that this has in fact happened. I think that makes our task very difficult. I would simply say that if what you are arguing is that activity of that sort is not justified because of what the Turks are doing, I do not regard that as an appropriate response.’

I simply make the point that when you are dealing with terrorist organisations it is sometimes more difficult when there are people of a particular ethnicity here in Australia who support some of the ideological positions that organisations take. Their presence here cannot be seen in any way as condoning terrorists. I think that is the fundamental issue. The committee did test these matters very fully with the community people involved. They would not be surprised that we recommend that the proscription of the PKK not be disallowed, but they did have an opportunity to put their views and they were heard. We put strongly the view that terrorism, wherever it occurs, cannot be condoned and that we have to act in relation to those issues.

I thank my colleagues on the committee for their continued work in relation to dealing with these very important and sensitive issues. I welcome the opportunity to have been able to speak to this report.

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