Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese seems resolute that his government will not assist 34 Australian ‘ISIS brides’ and their children to return to Australia from Syria.
The group, detained at the al-Roj camp in northern Syria, were among thousands of foreign nationals held in camps for families of former Islamic State fighters. When they tried to leave Syria on Monday, they were back. Albanese stated that the government had “a very firm view” that it would not provide assistance or repatriation.
For years, successive Australian governments have framed the return of citizens who travelled to Syria or Iraq as an unacceptable security risk. Officials have repeatedly emphasised that “the safety of Australians and the protection of Australia’s national interests remain the overriding priority.” This framing is politically convenient but obscures the human rights of its citizens abroad, who are detained under inhuman and degrading circumstances.
Under international law, there is no general right for citizens to be repatriated when they are detained or in difficulty abroad. Consular assistance, including facilitating return, is largely discretionary. Australia’s Consular Services Charter explicitly states that individuals “don’t have a legal right to consular assistance and shouldn’t assume assistance will be provided.”
The situation in Syrian detention camps, however, is exceptional.
For more than a decade, tens of thousands of foreign nationals—many of them women and children—have been held in camps such as al-Roj and al-Hol. The conditions in these camps are “dire”. They are overcrowded and lack adequate sanitation, and detainees have limited access to healthcare and face significant security concerns.
In this context, UN human rights bodies have consistently found that states have a duty to act to protect their citizens detained in these camps. This means that states must use their diplomatic capability and power to protect their citizens from serious and foreseeable harm. In the case of foreign nationals detained in Syrian camps, UN treaty bodies and experts have suggested that failing to repatriate citizens could amount to violations of fundamental rights, including the right to life and the prohibition on cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. Conversely, in exceptional circumstances where citizens face severe and ongoing human rights violations and the state is capable of mitigating that harm, doing nothing may itself breach international law.
For instance, in a case brought by family members of Finnish children detained in Syria, the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child found that the living conditions in detention, including insufficient food and water, posed “an imminent risk of irreparable harm to the children’s lives, their physical and mental integrity and their development” and amounted to a violation of the right to life. It stated that Finland had “a positive obligation to protect these children from an imminent risk of violation of their right to life and an actual violation of their right not to be subjected to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.”
Australia’s blanket refusal to act is therefore problematic. A categorical decision not to assist—without a plan, assessment, or alternative protective measures—does not align with its international human rights obligations and may amount to a violation of the right to life and the prohibition on cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.
The government’s reliance on security concerns cannot, by itself, justify inaction. National security is a legitimate interest, but it does not provide a carte blanche to disregard human rights obligations. Instead, the government must develop a plan for managed returns that mitigate these risks rather than refusing to engage altogether. The government previously considered such a framework. In 2024, then–home affairs minister Clare O’Neil was reportedly preparing to take a plan to cabinet to repatriate the remaining Australians from Syrian detention camps. These plans were ultimately shelved amid concerns about potential electoral backlash, illustrating how highly politicised the issue has become.
Furthermore, as the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights and counter terrorism, Professor Ben Saul, has argued, potential security risks would be better managed if this small group were allowed to return to Australia. “If you leave people without any kind of long-term immigration solution in a foreign country”, he said, “you do potentially expose people to being vulnerable to radicalisation by some armed group”. Furthermore, Australia’s “very extensive” terrorism laws would enable prosecution if offences had been committed.
The Home Affairs Minister’s decision to place a temporary exclusion order on one of the women, based on the advice of security agencies, could prevent her from returning for up to two years. But this simply kicks the can down the road. The Minister’s revelation that “security agencies have not provided advice that other members of the cohort meet the required legal thresholds for temporary exclusion orders” is also telling.
Managed repatriation is neither unprecedented nor unworkable. Australia itself has previously repatriated nationals from Syrian camps, including four women and 13 children from al-Roj in 2022. Several other states, including European countries and the United States, have also organised returns, combining security screening, rehabilitation and reintegration programs, and, where appropriate, criminal investigations and prosecutions. These examples demonstrate that repatriation can be structured in ways that mitigate risk while fulfilling human rights obligations.
International law does not demand that Australia ignore legitimate security concerns or act without any safeguards. It does, however, reject the use of these concerns as an excuse for inaction. Where Australia has the capacity to prevent foreseeable harm to its citizens by repatriating them, simply refusing to engage is not enough. A plan for managed returns is not only possible—it is what international law demands.
Dr Thomas Mulder is a Laureate Postdoctoral Fellow at the Evacuations Research Hub at the Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law, UNSW Sydney.
Jane McAdam AO is Scientia Professor of Law, ARC Laureate Fellow and Director of the Evacuations Research Hub at the Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law, UNSW Sydney.