{"id":29181,"date":"2016-10-19T06:00:15","date_gmt":"2016-10-18T19:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=29181"},"modified":"2016-10-18T10:30:01","modified_gmt":"2016-10-17T23:30:01","slug":"10-things-need-know-passport-cancellations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/10-things-need-know-passport-cancellations\/","title":{"rendered":"10 things you need to know about passport cancellations"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/p>\n
Passport cancellations are one of the few tangible and public measures of how Australia’s going in the fight against terrorism. ASIO made the latest number of passport cancellations public last week, when it tabled its Annual Report to Parliament<\/a>.<\/p>\n The report states that 62 Australian passports were cancelled over the past 12 months to prevent Australians from travelling overseas to engage in terrorism. That figure is down one third from a peak of 93 cancellations last year\u2014which coincided with the rise of the so-called \u2018Islamic State\u2019 or Daesh and its call for foreign fighters\u2014and is back to the 2013-14 level, when 45 passports were cancelled. Numbers haven’t yet dropped down to pre-Daesh single-digit levels.<\/p>\n So while Daesh and other Islamist groups are still attracting foreign fighters, the numbers seeking to travel have waned with the fortunes of those groups. The ASIO report tells us that the decline in cancellations is because fewer Australians are seeking to travel to fight in the Middle East. But there\u2019s still a relatively high number of cases, demanding a lot from Australia\u2019s counterterrorism resources.<\/p>\n Passport cancellations remain a complex and sometimes confusing issue. One of the most prominent cases is Oliver Bridgeman, whose passport was cancelled<\/a> in February while he was in Syria, soon followed by the issue of a warrant for his arrest<\/a>. After six months silence\u2014including speculation he’d been killed\u2014Bridgeman\u2019s lawyer says he’s alive<\/a> and still overseas.<\/p>\n Bridgeman and his family say it\u2019s all a misunderstanding<\/a>: he\u2019s just a healthy, happy, young surfer and school-leaver working for a children\u2019s charity in Syria, and the government\u2019s actions have left him stranded in a war zone.<\/p>\n Bridgeman provides a useful case study on Australia\u2019s passport cancellations, how and why these can be used, and what happens after.<\/p>\n So here are 10 things you need to know about passport cancellation.<\/p>\n In the Bridgeman case, we know that ASIO and the AFP have investigated his actions and associations and consider that they separately meet the threshold for passport cancellation and arrest on terrorism grounds. The Foreign Minister, the DPP and a magistrate agree. All of that remains subject to due process, and the protection of rights under the law. And that makes all such decisions tricky\u2014the application of the law is relatively straightforward when a crime is committed, but anticipatory and protective measures have a different threshold and host of complicating factors.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Passport cancellations are one of the few tangible and public measures of how Australia’s going in the fight against terrorism. ASIO made the latest number of passport cancellations public last week, when it tabled its …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":408,"featured_media":29182,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1031,1410,273,89],"class_list":["post-29181","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general","tag-asio","tag-border-security","tag-counterterrorism","tag-dfat"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\n