The Government yesterday moved to declare Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps a terrorist organisation, but they were warned much earlier, Rex Patrick reveals.
Following gross human rights violations in Iran in late 2022, the Australian Senate initiated an inquiry into the “Human rights implications of recent violence in Iran” to examine the situation on the ground and, amongst other things, to determine what actions were available to the Australian Government to respond to the human rights abuses.
During the Committee hearings on 28 November 2022, chaired by Tasmanian Senator Claire Chandler, the issue of listing the IRGC as a terrorist organisation came up at several stages. However, Professor Ben Saul, Challis Chair of International Law at the University of Sydney, told the Committee:
“Under the criminal code, you can only list as a terrorist organisation a body corporate or an unincorporated association. These are essentially corporations, NGOs or informal groupings of people, no matter how small. The way that has been interpreted by the Australian courts is that it excludes state entities of any kind, really.”
The Attorney-General’s department eventually agreed, and it wrote to the Senate Committee on January 31, 2023, advising:
…Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) is not the kind of entity that is covered by the terrorist organisations provisions in the Criminal Code.
However, when the Liberal Party majority on the Committee tabled its report on 11 February 2023, it recommended the Australian Government “take the necessary steps to formally categorise
the IRGC s as an organisation involved in supporting and facilitating terrorism.
Then party politics intervened, and Labor senators chose in their dissenting report to reject the recommendation, stating:
“Labor senators are disappointed at the disingenuous nature in which the report seeks to portray the response of government departments and agencies to the question of whether Australia’s terrorism laws allow for the IRGC to be listed as a terrorist entity.”
When the Labor Government formally responded in September 2023, it also rejected the recommendation, even though Foreign Minister Senator Wong had stated in the Senate on 7 February 2023, “… that the purpose of listings under the code is to make it easier to prosecute individuals in Australia for supporting terrorist organisations.”
Government response to a terrorist listing recommendation (Source: Senate)
It surrendered to the idea that “Listing under the Criminal Code applies to non-state actors and not state actors. The IRGC is, regrettably, a fully formed part of the Iranian state.”
And that was the end of that. Until yesterday. It begs the question if the IRGC) had been listed as a terrorist organisation earlier,
could more have been done before the attacks on the Adass Israel Synagogue and Lewis’ Continental Kitchen?
Human rights abuses in Iran
On 16 September 2022, a young Kurdish-Iranian woman, Mahsa (Jina) Amini, was detained in Tehran for failing to adhere to the strict dress code for women enforced in Iran. Within days of her arrest and while still in custody, she was admitted to hospital where she died.
Her death caused outrage and an uprising across Iran. Women and girls removed their hijabs and cut off their hair, and strikes were held in schools and universities.
The response from the Iranian leadership was both brutal and lethal, with over 500 people killed, including 64 minors, and 18,000 people arrested.
The Iranian community in Australia was vocal in its objections, and on November 7, 2022, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) phoned the Iranian charge d’affaires after it received reports of apparent efforts by Iranian authorities to intimidate the Iranian community in Australia in relation to the events taking place in Iran.
Get some legal Advice 12 December 2022 (Source: FOI)
Iranians in Australia take action
As the government walked away, many in the Iranian diaspora did not. Credit must be given to Senator Chandler, who continued to work with them (including connecting them to me to assist with their FOI difficulties).
The government refused to hand over documents on the IRGC in response to a Senate order that Senator Chandler initiated on 28 November 2023. In July 2024, she asked Minister Murray Watt a question in Parliament on the listing of the IRGC. Minister Watt responded with his head in the sand, “The reality is that the IRGC is a part of the Iranian state, and state actors under Australian law cannot be listed as terrorist organisations.”
Liberal Senator Paul Scarr interjected across the Senate Chamber, “Change the law!.”
Minister Watt accused Senator Chandler of being “grossly irresponsible” in initiating the debate.
Not giving up, on 16 September 2024, Senator Chandler initiated a debate in the Senate on a matter of public importance, urging the IRGC be listed, and again, on 8 October 2024, Senator Chandler initiated a debate in the Senate calling for, as a matter of urgency:
“The need for the Albanese Government to act in response to the Islamic Republic of Iran’s widespread sponsoring of terrorism, promotion of antisemitism and oppression of its people by listing the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organisation and declaring the current Iranian Ambassador to Australia persona non grata.”
She spoke on the matter and concluded her contribution with a warning:
“We hear constantly from the government the benefits of its dialogue with the Iranian regime, but it is clear to everyone paying attention that”
this dialogue is achieving nothing to rein in the regime’s behaviour …
Labor was just not interested, with Senator Tim Ayres revealing to the Senate that Foreign Minister Penny Wong had written to then shadow foreign affairs minister, Senator Simon Birmingham, urging the opposition not to proceed with the matter of urgency and stating:
“We maintain diplomatic relations with Iran because it’s in Australia’s national interest to do so and it is in the interests of our closest strategic partners.”
US joins Israel bombing Iran, genocide proceeds, Australia debates antisemitism
Chandler was right
With the Prime Minister yesterday expelling the Iranian ambassador and announcing he was going to list the IRGC as a terrorist organisation, it’s hard not to accept that Senator Chandler was right and Labor got it very wrong.
But the more important question that needs to be asked is, did the failings of Labor to list the IRGC much earlier contribute to the fire bombings of the Adass Israel Synagogue and Lewis’ Continental Kitchen? The answer to that has to be yes.
With a listing under Division 102 of the Criminal Code, ASIO and the Federal Police would have had more options available to deal with the perpetrators way before they lit the fires. I guess we’re all lucky no one got hurt.
As for where to go, some new legislation will need to be drafted to enable the listing. Perhaps Prime Minister Albanese can ring the Office of the Counter-Terrorism Ambassador to assist, after all, they offered to draft it more than two years ago.
Rex Patrick is a former Senator for South Australia and, earlier, a submariner in the armed forces. Best known as an anti-corruption and transparency crusader, Rex is also known as the "Transparency Warrior."