A legal fight is on to repatriate eight Australian women and their 18 children from a refugee camp in Syria.
The group is being detained in the country’s northeast by the Autonomous Administration of North East Syria (AANES) and its defence arm, the Syrian Democratic Forces.
It’s alleged the detention of the group is unlawful and questions are being asked about why successive federal governments have allowed some women and children to return and not others.
Save the Children launched the legal action in the Federal Court, claiming that without a formal decision the federal government had decided not to repatriate the latest group.
The group’s chief executive Mat Tinkler visited the camp last year and in a statement to the court said it was no place for a child to live and grow up.
They are the wives, widows and children of suspected Islamic State fighters and are not being identified to protect their safety.
They are at great risk, Tinkler said.
Emrys Nekvapil SC, for Save the Children, said the AANES wanted foreign governments, including Australia’s, to repatriate their citizens from the al-Roj camp.
The women are all Australian citizens.
Eight children were returned to Australia in 2019, and in October last year, four women and 13 children were repatriated.
“That’s an important feature of our argument because we say, in effect, why them and not the remainder,” Nekvapil said.
Save the Children requested a decision from the federal government in May on the repatriation of the latest group.
They inferred from a lack of decision that the government had actually decided not to repatriate the women and children, and have asked the court to infer the same.
Their case includes evidence from experts who say detention of women and children is unlawful under international law, Syrian law and the set of rules under which AANES operates, and that repatriation can be done easily because the AANES wants it to happen.
The Commonwealth had not put its key issues in the case before the court ahead of a case management hearing on June 16.
Craig Lenehan SC said they were still giving close consideration to the legality of the detention and would “nail our colours to the mast shortly”.
Both sides hope to have the case heard as early as September, citing the potential destabilisation of the situation in Syria.
In a statement, Tinkler said the lawsuit was a regretful last resort after years of engaging with various governments.
“The repatriations last October raised the remaining children’s hopes that they too would soon be out of harm’s way,” Tinkler said.
“Instead they feel they have been abandoned by their country and are losing hope for the future.”
Tinkler said they were innocent children being punished for the alleged actions of their parents.
One of the children is now an adult, while a number of others have been born since their mothers were detained.
