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Transcripts
February 19, 2026
SENATOR JAMES PATERSON
SHADOW MINISTER FOR DEFENCE
SENATOR FOR VICTORIA
TRANSCRIPT
INTERVIEW
SKY NEWS FIRST EDITION
Thursday, 19 February 2026
Topics: Labor should stop ISIS brides returning to Australia
E&OE…………………………………………………………………………………………
PETE STEFANOVIC: Joining us live, the Shadow Defence, the new Shadow Defence Minister, James Paterson. James, it's good to see you this morning. So, the government's still denying knowledge of any delegation, which was claimed in these encrypted messages. So, nothing to see here, it seems, James.
SENATOR JAMES PATERSON: Well, this is just typical of the Albanese government and particular of the Home Affairs Minister, Tony Burke, when it comes to matters of national security like this. They think they can get away with misleading the public. This is not the first repatriation of former ISIS brides to Australia on their watch. Of course, when the charity Save the Children sought to bring them to Australia, Tony Burke pretended he knew nothing about it. It later emerged he had secret meetings and told a public servant to leave the meeting. So frankly, I have no confidence in anything the government says when it comes to these things. All we know is someone who left this country, a tolerant, prosperous, free liberal democracy, to go and join the Islamic State caliphate, which persecutes people of ethnic and religious minorities underneath them, including using rape and torture and murder as weapons of war, is not someone that we want in this country. And the government should be doing everything they can to keep them out of this country not rolling out the welcome mat to bring them back.
STEFANOVIC: So temporary exclusion has been issued to one of them, which was your wish, but it ends there. Do you think it should be applied to all of them?
PATERSON: Yes. The short answer is yes. The fact that one temporary exclusion order has been applied to one of these cohort just demonstrates there is, in fact, a national security risk from these people. And I question why the entire cohort hasn't been slapped with temporary exclusion orders. And if the government says that the legal thresholds have not met, my colleague Senator Jonathan Duniam has already offered, on behalf of the Coalition, bipartisan support to amend the law to protect Australians. Whatever is necessary to keep these people out of our country should be done.
STEFANOVIC: So again, chatting to Matt Thistlethwaite this morning, I put that point to him, shouldn't they be kept overseas while investigating this, they haven't got any advice to suggest that they are a threat, therefore they'll likely be brought home, you say that's not good enough?
PATERSON: Well, Matt, here's some advice that suggests that they might be a threat. They went and joined Islamic State. They went and joined one of the most reprehensible terrorist organisations we've ever seen, a death cult that ruthlessly persecuted people under their control, that engaged in some of the worst horrific acts of terrorism and that has inspired terrorism all around the world, including allegedly the Bondi shooters who were found to have an Islamic State [flag], according to media reports, in their car on Bondi. So, I mean, if that's not enough advice for Matt Thistlethwaite and the Labor Party, then honestly, I wonder what it would take.
STEFANOVIC: So that would relate to the adults, not so much the kids though, so what do you do there?
PATERSON: Well, it has been previously the case under former governments that independent repatriation of minors occurred because essentially some of these children have become orphans while they're over there. And as Australian citizens, they were previously repatriated separately from adults. Now, if that is people's concern, then they should propose that instead. What we can't have is what appears to be, again, according to media reports, a freelance repatriations operation being run by Dr Jamal Rifi. Now, he's a respected community leader. But no matter how respected you are, private citizens should not be importing associates of a listed terrorist organisation, and it is particularly suspicious that Dr Jamal Rifi is such a close friend of Tony Burke. I mean, he ran the Friends of Tony Burke campaign in the last federal election to get the Home Affairs Minister re-elected in his seat.
STEFANOVIC: I'm curious about this line that the government is maintaining that it is not assisting in any way. And they say that it's not on them to issue the passports, it's others. Legally, they have to. So that's not... They're leaning on this as that's not exactly them helping. How do you bat that away?
PATERSON: Well, don't rely on my view. Professor Ben Saul, who is supportive of repatriating these people to Australia, has said in The Age and Sydney Morning Herald this morning that, of course, the government is assisting them, that granting them passports is assistance. It's also highly likely that the government has again provided citizenship by descent documents to any children born overseas to Australian parents. Now, this is not a straightforward process. This is not an easy process, particularly in a refugee camp in a region previously controlled by a terrorist organisation, where the Australian government has no presence on the ground. I get constituent requests all the time of people who've had children overseas in peaceful areas in our own region who say it takes months, sometimes even years, to get citizenship by descent and passports for their children where there is no security risk. So, the fact the government has been able to do this so quickly, so easily in this case, does suggest that they are in fact rolling out the welcome mat.
STEFANOVIC: Well, and then you've got these encrypted messages, and I'll just elaborate a bit more on what they are. So, according to The Daily Telegraph, yeah, here they are here, so it's through the women who were living in this Roj camp in northern Syria, says the Australian government conducted DNA tests for the sisters and children, issued Australian passports for them, which we just talked about, and sent a delegation to accompany the families from the camp in Australia. I mean, does that not prove active involvement?
PATERSON: Well, if those reports are correct, then yes, that's exactly what it proves. It is a choice of the Australian Government, either DFAT or Home Affairs or another agency, to send Australian officials in, I understand, some years ago to conduct these tests. There's no law which compels them to do that. And frankly, it's quite a dangerous area to operate in and you are taking risks with Australian Government personnel if you're sending them in. That's a choice. That is a choice that this government appears to have made based on those media reports and therefore appears that they do want to take steps to facilitate the return of these people despite what the Prime Minister has been disingenuously saying.
STEFANOVIC: And just getting back to the point, I mean, even though it denies it and it leans on the legalities of it all, whether it's DFAT or whether it is Home Affairs, foreign whatever, if you need to issue a passport, that in itself is government involvement, is it not?
PATERSON: Of course it is. It's assistance, it’s involvement, it's a welcome mat, it is all of those things. If the Albanese Government really wanted to keep these people out of our country, they could do so. It's very clear that's not what they want to do. We've offered bipartisan support to help them protect Australia because we don't want to see any increased risk beyond what we've already suffered over the last few years.
STEFANOVIC: We'll leave it there, James Paterson, good to chat, talk to you soon.
ENDS