On May 7, the United States repatriated 11 U.S. citizens, including five children, and one foreign-born minor. They had been detained in northeast Syria, where around 56,000 Syrian and foreign prisoners from the U.S.-led coalition’s decade-long war with the Islamic State remain held by U.S.-backed armed groups, including the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). This was the “largest single repatriation…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
Report says thousands of people held in little-reported facilities where authorities are violating human rights on a large scale
The US and UK are complicit in the detention of thousands of people, including British nationals, in camps and facilities in north-east Syria where disease, torture and death are rife, according to Amnesty International.
In a report, the charity says the western-backed region’s autonomous authorities are responsible for large-scale human rights violations against people held since the end of the ground war against Islamic State (IS) more than five years ago.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Readers respond to the recent court of appeal ruling that upheld the UK government’s decision to strip the 24-year-old of British citizenship
The case of Shamima Begum is less significant in that her appeals have failed under UK law, but rather in that UK law has been written to breach our obligations to follow the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights article 15.2, which states “No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality” (Shamima Begum ruling shows UK wants to wash its hands of such prisoners, 23 February).
I have a strong belief in human rights being universal and the UK adhering to these principles. When Ms Begum was stripped of her birthright British nationality she was not a citizen of Bangladesh, which stated that it would not accept her request for citizenship, ergo she was made arbitrarily stateless, contrary to international law. The progress of her case through the UK courts will surely end at the human rights courts, where the UK will lose.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Background to the legal battle as the court of appeal decides whether removal of her UK citizenship was unlawful
The court of appeal’s decision due on Friday on whether Shamima Begum, who travelled to Syria to join Islamic State as a child, was unlawfully stripped of her UK citizenship is the latest step in a long-running battle she has fought against the government. Here is the history of the case and why it has attracted so much publicity.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Twin explosions in the Iranian province of Kerman killed dozens and injured hundreds Wednesday at a memorial for top Revolutionary Guards general Qassem Soleimani, who was assassinated in a U.S. drone strike four years ago in Iraq. No one has yet claimed responsibility for the attack, but Iran has placed blame on Israel and the U.S, while U.S. officials and regional experts have suggested ISIS as…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
However, human rights group says UK lagging behind other western nations in repatriating families who lived under IS
Britain has agreed to repatriate a woman and five children from camps in Syria, the second time the UK has allowed an adult to return since the end of the ground war against Islamic State more than four years ago.
The release was announced by the Kurdish administration that controls north-east Syria – but a human rights group and a former minister accused the UK of lagging behind other western nations in allowing families who lived under IS to return.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Estimated 60 children among those trapped in detention camps since Islamic State collapse
A group of celebrities including Olivia Colman, Stephen Fry and Gillian Anderson have called on ministers to rescue and bring home British families trapped in detention camps in north-east Syria.
The stars, along with various NGOs including War Child UK and Human Rights Watch, the Tory peer Sayeeda Warsi and several national security experts, have signed an open letter to the UK government appealing for the rescue of approximately 25 British families, including an estimated 60 children most of whom are under 10 years old, who are languishing in the camps.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Exclusive: ‘I have spent half my life in a tent closed off by gates like a prison,’ says the child, who is under 10, in a voice message to Anthony Albanese
An Australian child trapped in a Syrian detention camp has pleaded directly with prime minister Anthony Albanese to be rescued and brought home.
“I am one of the children left behind in Roj camp and I have spent half my life in a tent closed off by gates like a prison,” a voice message sent to the prime minister’s office says. “I have never been to school, laid in grass or climbed a tree.”
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Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
During Covid, the Caribbean republic shut its borders, stranding citizens overseas; now it has left children vulnerable to illness, death and IS recruitment
When is it acceptable for a government to lock its citizens out of their country, to leave them stranded overseas, trampling the constitutional and human rights of those who pay their salaries? During a pandemic perhaps?
When is it acceptable to disown nationals, especially children who are victims of misguided decisions made by their brainwashed parents? When their parents left to join Islamic State perhaps?
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Former supreme court justice Jonathan Sumption on last week’s ruling on the home secretary’s decision to deprive Begum of her citizenship. Plus letters from Ilina Todorovska, Owen Stewart, Andrew Snowdon and Carmel Bedford
Prof Conor Gearty complains about the special immigration appeals commission’s “deference” to the government in its judgment on Shamima Begum (Shamima Begum has shown up courts’ deference to this government. It’s a worrying new era, 23 February). Decisions on deprivation of citizenship are required by statute to be made by the home secretary. The commission’s job was therefore to decide whether the home secretary’s decision was properly made, not whether it agreed with it. That is what it did. In a democracy governed by the rule of law, Prof Gearty should not have been surprised.
Meanwhile, his analysis distracts attention from the real scandal. By statute, the home secretary cannot deprive a person of British citizenship if it would render them stateless. The person must have citizenship of at least one other country. When the decision was made, in 2019, Ms Begum was 19. She was a citizen of Bangladesh, but only in the most technical sense. She had provisional citizenship until she was 21, when it would lapse unless she took it up. This was because her parents were born there. But she has never been to Bangladesh. She has no links with the country. And Bangladesh has disowned her. Her Bangladeshi citizenship always was a legal fiction. Today, it is not even that. She is 23. As a result of the home secretary’s decision, she is stuck in a camp in Syria, with no citizenship anywhere and no prospect of one. Children who make a terrible mistake are surely redeemable. But statelessness is for ever.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Shamima Begum has lost her latest legal battle to reverse the decision that stripped her of her British citizenship. The ruling from Judge Robert Jay of the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC) means that she can’t return to the UK from her current home in a refugee camp in northern Syria.
Shamima was 15 when Islamic State (IS) groomed her to leave her East London home for Syria. This was in 2015. While she was there, the group forced her to marry an IS fighter. She had three children, who have all since died. In February 2019, her legal team said the UK government left her stateless. This was after the then-home secretary Sajid Javid revoked her British citizenship. He claimed this was on ‘national security grounds’ after she was found in the Syrian camp.
A UK tribunal ruled in 2020 that she was not stateless. It claimed this was because she was “a citizen of Bangladesh by descent” at the time the decision was made. This was due to her mother being Bangladeshi. Javid revoked Shamima’s citizenship despite the fact she had never been to Bangladesh. Under the Bangladeshi “blood line” law, nationality and citizenship lapse when a person reaches the age of 21. This is triggered unless they make efforts to retain it. Shamima has not done this, and was aged 19 when the decision was made.
When rejecting her appeal, Jay said:
under our constitutional settlement these sensitive issues are for the secretary of state to evaluate and not for the commission.
However, he said there was “considerable force” in Begum’s arguments. Jay also noted that Javid’s conclusion that she had travelled voluntarily to Syria “is as stark as it is unsympathetic”.
Jay continued:
Further, there is some merit in the argument that those advising the secretary of state see this as a black and white issue, when many would say that there are shades of grey.
This presumably refers to Shamima’s account that IS groomed, raped, and abused her. Given that she was 15 when the group trafficked her, she clearly could not consent to any sexual contact. It is evidently the UK government’s position that Shamima was – and remains – a security threat who joined IS and cannot be allowed into the UK. Instead it appears that the “shades of grey” Jay refers to are a sickening euphemism for the abuse and trafficking of a young girl.
Indeed, lawyer Samantha Knights, representing Shamima, told the SIAC hearing last November that her client had been “influenced” along with her friends by a “determined and effective” IS group “propaganda machine”. She said in written evidence there was “overwhelming” evidence Shamima had been:
recruited, transported, transferred, harboured and received in Syria for the purposes of ‘sexual exploitation’ and ‘marriage’ to an adult male.
Gareth Peirce and Daniel Furner, lawyers representing Shamima, said the ruling meant:
there is now no protection for a British child trafficked out of the UK.
They confirmed that “every possible avenue to challenge this decision will be urgently pursued”. Shamima can now appeal the decision by the SIAC in the Court of Appeal.
Amnesty International UK’s refugee and migrant rights director Steve Valdez-Symonds said:
The power to banish a citizen like this simply shouldn’t exist in the modern world.
Shamima Begum had lived all her life in the UK right up to the point she was lured to Syria as an impressionable 15-year-old.
Activist and writer Ilyas Nagdee said:
Shamima Begum has lost her appeal and remains stateless. A ruling that at its heart abandons a young woman, who was victim of serious exploitation as a young teenager to statelessness. An abdication of responsibility by a state using a policy of deprivation that shouldn't exist.
— Ilyas Nagdee (@ilyas_nagdee) February 22, 2023
Co-editor of Red Pepper Magazine Amardeep Dhillon said:
Shamima Begum’s loss of appeal is a gross miscarriage of justice against a girl who was groomed and traumatised, and a warning sign that the citizenship of diaspora groups is contingent on avoiding criminalisation. The mainstream media is complicit in this harm.
— Amardeep S Dhillon (@AmarDeepSinghD) February 22, 2023
Academic Gurminder Bhambra pointed out the cost to all of us:
Once any government begins to remove rights from its citizens, those rights, for the rest of the population, are no longer rights, but privileges. Privileges given (and taken away) at the whim of arbitrary power.
In the process, we all lose.https://t.co/lgoEfaFbA9
— Gurminder K Bhambra (@GKBhambra) February 22, 2023
Grassroots organisers CAGE questioned the government’s claims about security threats:
The Shamima Begum case has nothing to do with national security.
Citizenship deprivation & the hostile environment policies were both part of a culture war strategy which incited anti Muslim & racist sentiment.
This is how we ended up with the most far right govt since 1945. https://t.co/VaJQdFcKQ2
— CAGE (@UK_CAGE) February 22, 2023
Dr Zubaida Haque explained that the decision is likely to have severe implications for British citizens with lineage from other countries:
Shamima Begum was born in the UK. She was raised here. She never visited Bangladesh. She lost her British citizenship on the basis that she was also a Bangladeshi national. She wasn't. SIAC's decision means that for most of us our citizenship is NOT secure https://t.co/jDJwWhjfzI
— Dr Zubaida Haque (@Zubhaque) February 22, 2023
MP Bell Ribeiro-Addy also emphasised the two-tier citizenship system:
Shamima Begum was born & groomed in the UK and trafficked to Syria as a minor by a western spy.
The Government's choice to strip her of citizenship is a dereliction of duty.
It highlights the two-tier citizenship system which now exists in our country.https://t.co/r6TG9LmbHv
— Bell Ribeiro-Addy MP (@BellRibeiroAddy) February 22, 2023
Shamima has been here many times. Each time her legal battles are covered by the mainstream media, racists come crawling out of the woodwork. They deny she was ever trafficked or abused. They use her as an example of the threat of ‘Islamist extremism.’ It’s not at all surprising that the government are doggedly opposing her attempts to avoid statelessness. These are the same people who’ve enacted the Nationality and Borders Act which enshrines the ability to strip people of their citizenship into law.
Shamima’s treatment at the hands of a hostile government and a craven media says absolutely everything about what kind of country the UK is. This is a place where a child who was trafficked, raped, and abused, whose three children all died, can be left stateless and shoved towards a country she has never known, simply because of where her parents come from. This is what it’s like to not be white in Britain. It doesn’t matter who you are, who you know, how integrated you become, or anything like that. If you’re a person of colour, and Muslim on top of that, your citizenship can and will be stripped away from you.
Two years ago, when the Canary last covered Shamima’s citizenship battle, we concluded:
Conditional citizenship for some is conditional citizenship for all.
Being considered a person with full rights is for some, but not all. This rotting society is only as good as its most vulnerable people. What does that make the UK? A country that has unending sympathy and generosity of spirit for whiteness in all its guises, and a vicious disdain for brown people. To be brown and Muslim in the UK is to feel, on many levels, how much your life and death mean absolutely nothing.
Featured image via YouTube screenshot/BBC News
Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse
Tribunal hears there were grounds to suspect the then 15-year-old had been groomed as a child bride
Police should have helped Shamima Begum return to Britain after she joined Islamic State in Syria because there were grounds to suspect she had been groomed as a child bride, a court has heard.
Samantha Knights KC told a tribunal that the police had an obligation to investigate whether Begum, who was 15 when she left the UK, was a victim of human trafficking, and then help her return if she was.
Lawyers for 23-year-old who left UK to join Islamic State in 2015 challenge ‘hasty’ decision to revoke citizenship
Shamima Begum, who left Britain as a schoolgirl to join Islamic State (IS) in Syria, was likely to have been the victim of child trafficking and sexual exploitation, a court has heard.
Lawyers acting for the 23-year-old began a new appeal on Monday against the removal of her British citizenship at a hearing of the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (Siac).
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Germany latest to end peacekeeping mission as operations prove unable to stop Islamic extremist insurgency
Thousands of international troops are withdrawing from Mali amid surging violence, growing Russian influence and an acute humanitarian crisis.
On Wednesday Germany became the latest country to end its participation in the UN peacekeeping mission in the unstable west African country. Earlier this week, British officials said that 300 British soldiers sent in 2020 to join the United Nations force would be returning earlier than planned.
Following its liberation from Islamic State, Raqqa is rebuilding its damaged infrastructure, economy, health and education sectors, and constructing a pluralistic, grassroots democracy, reports ANF English.
This post was originally published on Green Left.
Woman, said to have been trafficked, is only adult allowed back since end of Islamic State ground war
A British woman and her child have been repatriated from a Syrian camp, the first time an adult has been allowed to come back to the UK from detention since the end of the ground war against Islamic State.
The Foreign Office said that British policy to those held in Syria remained unchanged, and that it considered requests for help on “a case by case basis”, but campaigners said it was a significant first step.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
About 60 wives, sons and daughters of slain or jailed IS combatants to be rescued from Roj camp, but some women face arrest upon return to Australia
The youngest, most unwell and most vulnerable of the Australian children currently held in squalid Syrian detention camps will be the first ones repatriated to Australia. But some of their mothers could face arrest – and potential charges – upon return to the country.
The Australian government is currently implementing plans to repatriate about 60 Australian women and children – wives, sons and daughters of slain or jailed Islamic State combatants – who have been held for more than three years in the dangerous detention camps in north-east Syria.
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Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Families argued detention in Syria exposed the two women and their children to inhumane treatment
The European court of human rights has condemned France over its refusal to repatriate French women who travelled to Syria with their partners to join Islamic State and are currently being held with their children at Kurdish-run prison camps.
The ruling will be studied closely by other countries who still have citizens detained in camps in north-eastern Syria, including the UK.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
The UK government has wholly failed in its duty towards her, say Flora Mackechnie and Nicola Bailey
It should never have come to alleged espionage for us to notice that what happened to the Bethnal Green trio has been covered up from the very beginning (Shamima Begum’s is a story of trafficking, betrayal and now, it seems, a state cover-up, 2 September). I have been confounded by the equanimity that met the government’s decision to revoke Shamima Begum’s citizenship and the supreme court’s bizarre ruling, which accepted that she had limited access to a fair trial while not seeing fit to allow her return to the UK.
Begum is the legal responsibility of the UK, and the rejection of this duty encapsulates the political abuse of the law and the unfathomable public acceptance of this. The irony of human rights is that they are popular on a superficial level, but where they are truly required, they are contentious and contradicted. If we make exceptions to rights for those who need them most, we simply do not have any rights.
Jiyan Tolhidan (Salwa Yusuf), a leader of the Syrian Defence Force (SDF) Counter Terrorism Units, and who led the fight against ISIS, was murdered by Turkey in a drone strike on July 22, reports Sarah Glynn.
This post was originally published on Green Left.
Exclusive: Investigation by group of prominent human rights lawyers also criticises Syria and Iraq
Turkey should face charges in front of the international court of justice for being complicit in acts of genocide against the Yazidi people, while Syria and Iraq failed in their duty to prevent the killings, an investigation endorsed by British human rights lawyer Helena Kennedy has said.
The groundbreaking report, compiled by a group of prominent human rights lawyers, is seeking to highlight the binding responsibility states have to prevent genocide on their territories, even if they are carried out by a third party such as Islamic State (IS).
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Parliamentary report finds ‘compelling evidence’ of trafficking and highlights missed opportunities to protect vulnerable people later stripped of citizenship
There is “compelling evidence” that British women and children currently detained in camps in north-east Syria were trafficked to the country against their will, according to a new parliamentary report.
After a six-month inquiry by the all-party parliamentary group (APPG) on trafficked Britons in Syria, the report published on Thursday highlights how systemic failures by UK public bodies enabled Islamic State trafficking of vulnerable women and children as young as 12.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
The recent Islamic State (ISIS) attack on the al-Sina’a prison in Hesekê, northeast Syria, made headlines around the world, reports Peter Boyle. Aimed at freeing the almost 4000 ISIS members, the breakout began with an attack by suicide bombers on January 20.
This post was originally published on Green Left.
On October 8, a terrible blast struck the worshippers attending Friday noon prayers at the Gozar-e-Sayed Abad Mosque in the Khan Abad district of Bandar, the capital of Kunduz, one of Afghanistan’s largest cities in its northern belt. This is a mosque frequented by Shia Muslims, who were referred to as “our compatriots” by Taliban spokesperson Zabiullah Mujahid. Forty-six people died immediately in the blast, and local officials said that many more people were injured in the incident.
The post Afghanistan Tackles The Islamic State appeared first on PopularResistance.Org.
This post was originally published on PopularResistance.Org.
Rights watchdog accuses Britain of turning a blind eye to degrading treatment of those who lived under IS
Britain is colluding in torture and degrading treatment by refusing to repatriate women and children held in indefinite detention in Syrian prison camps, according to a report from a human rights watchdog.
The assessment by Rights and Security International (RSI) accuses the UK and others of turning a blind eye to lawless and squalid conditions in two camps that contain 60,000 women and children, many held since the collapse of Islamic State.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Host Selwyn Manning with security analyst Dr Paul Buchanan on this week’s A View From Afar podcast. Video: EveningReport.nz on YouTube
A VIEW FROM AFAR: Podcast with Selwyn Manning and Paul Buchanan
In this week’s security podcast, Dr Paul G. Buchanan and host Selwyn Manning discuss:
The background to this episode is the tragic, terrifying, attack that were committed against unarmed innocent people at West Auckland’s LynnMall Countdown supermarket, by Ahamed Aathill Mohamed Samsudeen.
The attack occurred last Friday, 3 September 2021. It ended with the hospitalisation of seven people, and, the death of Samsudeen, who was fatally shot by special tactics police officers during his attempt to kill and injure as many people as he could.
Immediately after, the Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern told the nation that the dead man was a terrorist and that she herself, the police, and the courts were all aware of how dangerous he was and had been seeking to protect New Zealand from this man.
Within days of the attacks, we learned, that Samsudeen was a troubled man with psychologists describing him as angry, capable of carrying out his threats, and displaying varying degrees of mental illness and disorder.
Refugee who sought asylum
Samsudeen was a refugee who sought asylum in New Zealand after experiencing, through his formative years civil war and ethnic cleansing in Sri Lanka, who, at around 20 years of age, arrived in New Zealand on a student visa and then sought political asylum.
He was eventually granted refugee status, and since then spent years in prison on various charges and convictions – largely involving the possession of terrorist propaganda seeded on the internet by Islamic State (ISIS), and, threats showing intent to commit terrorist acts against New Zealanders.
In this week’s episode, Dr Buchanan and Manning examine questions about whether this tragedy could have been prevented and considered New Zealand’s:
Dr Buchanan and Manning also analyse whether it is necessary for the New Zealand government to move to tighten New Zealand’s terrorism security laws. And, if it does, how the intended new laws compare to other Five Eyes member countries.
Republished in partnership with EveningReport.nz
This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.
Asia Pacific Report newsdesk
The Migrant Action Trust has condemned a proposal by a diversity academic calling for a New Zealand nation-building course before people are granted permanent residence or citizenship as “dangerous” and “discriminating”.
“This proposal is dangerous. It is dangerous because it comes at a time when the world — including Aotearoa — has demonised a religion and those associated with that religion,” the trust said.
“We have inculcated in the minds of others that ‘these people’, and by association, all people of colour are a danger.
“That is a dangerous, discriminating, and damaging legacy. Just ask Māori.”
The call for a “specific nation-building” course for potential citizens of Aotearoa has been made by Professor Edwina Pio, chair of diversity at Auckland University of Technology.
She made the plea in a paper titled “Diffusing Destructive Devotions: Deploying Counter Terrorism” days after last Friday’s knife attack at Auckland’s Countdown supermarket in LynnMall.
But the Migrant Action Trust chair, Associate Professor Camille Nakhid, described the proposal as “cynical”, saying it raised many questions.
‘Values of our colonisers?’
“Firstly, whose values will inform this nation-building paper? Will they be the values of the colonisers or of our tangata whenua? Will it be the values of those whose labour built this land or those whose dubious transactions stole this land?,” Dr Nakhid asked in a statement.
“Will it be the refugee with the ideologies of terrorist groups or the resident Pākehā with the ideologies of terrorist Pākehā groups which hold the ideologies of the dominant Pākehā group which hold the ideologies of white supremacists?
“Who will be made to take this nation-building paper? Will it only be potential citizens such as migrants, asylum seekers and those from refugee backgrounds but not those wanting to remain permanent residents?
“What about citizens themselves who mistrust the government, challenge their laws and protest their policies?
“Will they need to go back to school to take this nation-building paper?”
Dr Pio’s research had found lone terrorists to be “dangerous and hard to combat” when compared to group terrorists.
She said “higher impact” policies were needed to combat terrorism and she called for legislation to require people to pass nation-building courses before being granted citizenship or permanent residence.
A Sri Lankan-born refugee, Ahamed Aathil Mohamed Samsudeen, 32, stabbed seven people in the Countdown supermarket before he was shot dead by police.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern described the Islamic State supporter as a “lone wolf terrorist”.
This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.
By Katie Todd, RNZ News reporter
An Australian criminologist who deemed the New Zealand shopping mall attacker “low risk” in 2018 believes there were missed opportunities to steer him away from violent extremism.
Ahamed Samsudeen was described as a high risk to the community when he was sentenced in July for possessing Islamic State propaganda — with the means and motivation to commit violent acts.
However, three years earlier, Australian National University criminologist Dr Clarke Jones told the High Court Ahamed did not appear to be violent and did not fit the profile of a young Muslim person who had been radicalised.
At the time Dr Jones suggested “a carefully designed, culturally sensitive and closely supervised intervention programme in the Auckland Muslim community”.
Now, he said, it was unclear how much rehabilitation actually took place.
“People can change, sometimes quickly, sometimes over a longer period of time. But back in 2018, we didn’t think that he was violent,” he explained.
At the time Samsudeen appeared to feel marginalised and disconnected, Dr Clarke said, like he couldn’t “get his foot up” in society.
‘Rigid life views’
“Some of the material he was reading was of concern and he had fairly rigid views around religion and around life in general. But he’d also had some experience in difficult times and was, I would argue, deeply depressed.”
On Friday, Samsudeen walked into a Countdown supermarket in LynnMall, picked up a knife and stabbed at least shoppers, leaving some of them critically injured, before he was shot dead by tactical force police tailing him.
In the High Court in July, Samsudeen had admitted two charges of using a document for pecuniary advantage, two charges of knowingly distributing restricted material and one charge of failing to assist the police in their exercise of a search power.
Another expert was consulted — forensic psychiatrist Dr Jeremy Skipworth — who echoed Dr Clarke’ concerns.
“Dr Skipworth said that any form of home detention would tend to further exacerbate your mental health concerns, and that your successful community reintegration is likely to be assisted by cornerstones, such as stable housing, personal support, appropriate employment and medical care,” reads Justice Wylie’s sentencing notes.
Justice Wylie imposed a sentence of supervision, with special conditions, including a psychological assessment and a rehabilitation programme with a service called Just Community.
Dr Jones said he really would like to know more about what support Samsudeen was actually given in Corrections.
‘Was he responsive?’
“Was he responsive to that treatment, if he was receiving any treatment at all, or was the focus more on on the security side and the monitoring and the surveillance?”
Asked if the terrorist had enough support to “get better”, Deputy Prime Minister Grant Robertson said there had been attempts to change the man’s mind — and none of them were successful.
But in a family statement released after the attack, Samsudeen’s brother said he sometimes listened.
“He would hang up the phone on us when we told him to forget about all of the issues he was obsessed with. Then he would call us back again himself when he realised he was wrong.
“Aathil was wrong again [on Friday]. Of course we feel very sad that he could not be saved. The prisons and the situation was hard on him and he did not have any support. He told us he was assaulted there.”
Dr Clarke said, “I would say that we haven’t got the balance right. In this case there was too much focus on the counter-terrorism or counter violent extremism narrative, rather than actually getting to the core of what was wrong with Mr Samsudeen.”
“We can always improve the way we do things to have have greater preventative sort of mechanisms within government, police and communities.”
Dr Clarke said what happened in LynnMall was a tragedy and a terrible situation.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.
By Sarah Robson, RNZ News Reporter
Name suppression for the man responsible for yesterday’s New Zealand terror attack at a west Auckland supermarket has been revoked, but his name cannot be published yet.
The High Court has given his family who live overseas at least 24 hours to seek further suppression orders.
The Sri Lankan national was shot dead by police after stabbing six people inside Countdown in LynnMall.
Suppression orders prevented details about his identity and background from being made public.
The government filed an urgent application last night to have the court orders lifted, so details about the man’s identity and background could be made public.
In a judgment last night, Justice Wylie said there was no longer any proper basis for the suppression orders.
But he said the man’s family live overseas and lawyers needed time to contact them to take instructions.
He said he could consider extending the 24-hour period if needed.
Isis propaganda
However, it can be revealed the man was sentenced in July to one year of supervision after he was found guilty by a jury in the High Court at Auckland of two charges of possessing Isis propaganda that promoted terrorism.
He was found guilty of another charge of failing to comply with a search, but he was acquitted of a third charge of possession of objectionable material and a charge of possessing a knife in a public place.
The state had sought to charge him under the Terrorism Suppression Act, but failed after a High Court judge ruled that planning a terror attack was not an offence under the law.
Because he had already spent three years in custody awaiting trial, he did not receive a further prison term for his offending.
Despite that, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said he had been under surveillance since 2016, because of his support for a violent ideology inspired by Islamic State.
The man was being so closely monitored by a surveillance and tactical team that police shot him within 60 seconds of the attack starting.
On the radar of authorities
He arrived in New Zealand in October 2011.
He first came to the attention of authorities in 2016, when police formally warned him about posting anti-Western, pro-Isis, extremist content on the internet.
The man had also at some point told a worshipper at an Auckland mosque that he wanted to go to Syria to fight for Isis.
In a July 2020 judgment, Justice Downs said in May 2017, he had booked a one-way flight to Singapore but was arrested at Auckland Airport.
When police searched his apartment, they found a large hunting knife under the mattress on the floor and secure digital cards containing fundamentalist material, including propaganda videos and photos of the man posing with a firearm.
He was remanded in custody and in June 2018, he pleaded guilty to distributing restricted publications. In August 2018, he was sentenced to supervision, Justice Downs’ 2020 judgment said.
But the day after his sentencing, he went and bought the same model of hunting knife that police had earlier found under his mattress.
Arrested again
He was arrested again and another search found a large he had a large amount of violent Isis material, including one video about how to kill “non-Muslims”.
This time, the state sought to charge the man under the Terrorism Suppression Act, for planning a terrorist act.
But Justice Downs said that in itself was not an offence under the law.
In his decision, Justice Downs said: “Terrorism is a great evil. ‘Lone wolf’ terrorist attacks with knives and other makeshift weapons, such as cars or trucks, are far from unheard of.
“Recent events in Christchurch demonstrate New Zealand should not be complacent. Some among us are prepared to use lethal violence for ideological, political or religious causes.
“The absence of an offence of planning or preparing a terrorist act … could be an Achilles heel.”
Justice Downs said it was not for the courts to create such an offence.
“The issue is for Parliament,” he said.
A copy of Justice Downs’ judgment was provided to the Attorney-General, the Solicitor-General and the Law Commission.
High Court trial
The man finally stood trial in the High Court at Auckland in May this year, on lesser charges.
A jury found him guilty of two charges of possessing Isis propaganda that promoted terrorism and one charge of failing to comply with a search.
He was acquitted of a third charge of possessing objectionable material and a charge of possessing a knife in a public place.
The man was sentenced in July.
In her sentencing notes, Justice Fitzgerald said the two publications on which he was found guilty were “nasheeds” – religious hymns.
Both were classified by the Censor as objectionable and contained Isis imagery and lyrics.
Justice Fitzgerald did not accept the explanation that he was listening to them to improve his Arabic language skills.
“Rather, I accept that the broader context to your possession of these nasheeds, which included a range of other materials relating to Isis or Isil, suggests that you have an operative interest in Isis.
“In other words, I do not accept that you might have simply stumbled across these and other Isis-related materials in your research of Islam or the historic Islamic State,” she said.
Report raised further flags
A pre-sentencing report raised further flags.
“The report writer suggests that you support the goals and methods of Isis,” Justice Fitzgerald said.
“The report writer concludes that the risk of you reoffending in a similar way to the present charges is high.
“It suggests that you have the means and motivation to commit violent acts in the community and, despite not having violently offended to date, as posing a very high risk of harm to others.”
Given he had already spent three years in custody awaiting trial, the man was sentenced to one-year supervision.
There were restrictions on his use of electronic devices, the internet and social media.
“The Police and Community Corrections clearly have concerns that you pose a not insignificant risk to the broader community,” Justice Fitzgerald said in her sentencing notes.
“I do not know whether those concerns are right and I sincerely hope that they are not, though having regard to all of the materials available to the court, I can say that they are not wholly fanciful.”
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern says an attack at Auckland’s New Lynn Countdown supermarket today was a terrorist attack carried out by a violent extremist.
The prime minister and Police Commissioner Andrew Coster addressed media after the man was shot dead at a west Auckland mall this afternoon.
It is understood six people – all shoppers at the mall – have been wounded in the incident at LynnMall in New Lynn.
A St John Ambulance spokesperson said three patients in a critical condition and one patient in a serious condition had been taken to Auckland City Hospital; one patient in a moderate condition had been taken to Waitakere hospital; and one patient in a moderate condition had been taken to Middlemore Hospital.
Ardern revealed the terrorist was a Sri Lankan national who had arrived in New Zealand in October 2011 and he became a person of national security interest from 2016.
The reasons he was known to agencies was subject to suppression orders, but Ardern said it was her view that it was in the public interest to share as much information as possible.
The prime minister did say the terrorist held a violent ideology inspired by the Islamic State, but it would be wrong to direct any frustration at anyone other than this individual.
Personally aware
She said she was personally aware of the terrorist before today’s attack.
Ardern said it was a senseless attack and she was sorry it had happened.
“What happened today was despicable. It was carried out by an individual.”
Ardern said the individual was under constant monitoring, and he was shot and killed within 60 seconds of the attack starting.
The police team who was monitoring shot and killed him.
Commissioner Coster said the man had been under heavy surveillance because of concerns about his ideology.
He had entered the store and obtained a knife from within the store before starting the attack.
When the man approached police with the knife he was shot and killed.
Surveillance teams ‘close’
Coster said the surveillance teams were “as close as they possibly could be without compromising the surveillance”.
“I acknowledge that this situation raises questions about whether police could have done more, whether police could have intervened more quickly. I’m satisfied based on the information available to me that the staff involved did not only what we expect they would do in this situation, but did it with great courage,” he said.
“The reality is, that when you are surveilling someone on a 24/7 basis, it is not possible to be immediately next to them at all times. The staff intervened as quickly as they could and they prevented further injury in what was a terrifying situation,” Coster said.
Ardern said all legal and surveillance power had been used to try to keep people safe from this individual.
“What I can say is that we have utilised every legal and surveillance power available to us to try and keep people safe from this individual. Many agencies and people were involved and all were motivated by the same thing – trying to keep people safe.”
Coster said there had been nothing that would tell police the extent of his intentions, or that he intended to do this today.
He said the individual was very surveillance-conscious, and surveillance teams needed to maintain a distance to be effective.
intervened ‘in 60 seconds’
“There was nothing to prevent him being in the community and we were doing absolutely everything possible to monitor him and indeed the fact that we were able to intervene so quickly — in roughly 60 seconds — shows just how closely we were watching him.”
Ardern said the local Muslim community had been “nothing but helpful and supportive. It would be wrong to direct any frustration to anyone beyond this individual. That is who is culpable, that is who is responsible — no one else”.
She said his past behaviour and action did not reach the threshold to have him in in prison, which was why he was being constantly monitored.
An eyewitness told RNZ she had seen a man running around armed with a knife and heard many people screaming.
Another shopper who was in the supermarket at the time heard someone scream before shoppers started running towards the door.
Heavily armed police and ambulances remain at the scene.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.