world
Three Australian Women Charged With Slavery and Terrorism Offenses After Repatriation From Syrian Camp
Three women who returned from a Syrian refugee camp were charged with slavery and terrorism offenses linked to the Islamic State group and denied bail in Australian courts on Friday. Kawsar Abbas and her daughter Zeinab Ahmed face crimes against humanity charges in Melbourne over allegations they bought a Yazidi slave, while Janai Safar faces terrorism membership charges in Sydney.
AB
BBC NewsAudio version
Tap play to generate a narrated version.
Three Australian women and their nine children arrived in Australia on two Qatar Airways flights from Doha on Thursday after years in the Roj camp in northeast Syria. Kawsar Abbas, 53, and her daughter Zeinab Ahmed, 31, appeared via video link in a Melbourne court on Friday and were refused bail on charges relating to events in Syria between 2014 and 2019.
Post by @ABC on X
Abbas faces four crimes against humanity charges and Ahmed faces two slavery charges, each carrying a maximum penalty of 25 years in prison. Court documents allege the family bought a female Yazidi slave for $10,000 and kept her in the family home, with police stating Abbas was complicit in the purchase.
In a separate matter in Sydney, Janai Safar, 32, was arrested at Sydney Airport on Thursday. She faces one count of being a member of a terrorist organization and one count of entering or remaining in an area controlled by a terrorist organization, each carrying a maximum penalty of 10 years.
A judge refused her bail application on Friday during a video link from prison. Safar’s lawyer told the court that exceptional circumstances existed because both she and her 9-year-old son were likely suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and the boy knew no one else in Australia.
Abbas, her husband and children traveled to Syria in 2014. Safar is alleged to have followed her Islamic State fighter partner there in 2015; the partner died in 2017. All three women were detained by Kurdish forces in March 2019 and held at the Roj camp, which houses mostly women and children displaced from former Islamic State-controlled areas.
According to police, Australia made travel to the former Islamic State stronghold of Raqqa without legitimate reason illegal between 2014 and 2017.
