Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke insists the Federal Government acted quickly and on advice from ASIO in taking action against Iran. Photo: Facebook
The Federal Government has described as nonsense the Israeli government’s claim that it had shamed Australia into expelling Iran’s ambassador.
Iran’s ambassador to Canberra, Ahmad Sadeghi, has been expelled from Australia following revelations that the Iranian government orchestrated antisemitic attacks against the Australian Jewish community.
The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) will also be listed as a terrorist organisation in Australia once enabling legislation is passed.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced the decisions on Tuesday (26 August), referring to ASIO evidence of Iran’s involvement in antisemitic attacks on Australian soil.
The Iranian government has responded by rejecting the accusations, saying Australia took the action only to appease Israel.
Iran labelled Mr Albanese a “weak politician” and has promised “reciprocal action”, even though Australian diplomats were safely removed from Tehran to a third country before Mr Albanese expelled the Iranian ambassador.
Just last week, it was Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who described Mr Albanese as a “weak leader”, over Australia’s decision to formally recognise Palestine at the United Nations and the visa refusal for a far-right Israeli MP.
Following the expulsion of the Iranian ambassador, however, the Israeli government appeared to take credit for the Australian decisions.
“Prime Minister Netanyahu has made a very forthright intervention when it comes to Australia, a country in which we have a long history of friendly relations,” an Israeli government spokesperson said during an overnight media briefing.
“He made those comments because he did not believe that the actions of the Australian government had gone anywhere near far enough to address the issues of antisemitism.
“He made very forthright comments about the Prime Minister himself.
“We certainly see it from Israel that Australia taking the threats against Israel and the Jewish people, Jewish Australians living in Australia, for the Australian government to take those threats seriously is a positive outcome.”
By Wednesday morning, Australia’s Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke was dismissing Israel’s claims of credit as “complete nonsense” and stressed the government acted purely on the advice from ASIO.
“There was not a minute between us receiving this assessment and us starting to work through what we would do as a response,” Mr Burke told ABC Radio.
“We’ve taken this action because Iran has attacked Australians. No other country is involved in terms of that conclusion.”
The minister also rejected Iran’s assertion that the Australian Government’s accusations against it were false.
“They’re not made public unless we are very, very confident of the facts that we’re providing to the public,” Mr Burke said.
“So people should have a very high level of assurance as to what we stood up and informed people of yesterday.”
Domestically, while the Federal Opposition has expressed support for the government’s actions against Iran, shadow foreign minister Michaelia Cash has questioned why the IRGC wasn’t listed as a terrorist organisation sooner.
“We demanded action two and a half years ago,” she said during an interview with Seven.
“The Iranian community in Australia demanded action two and a half years ago, and this government did nothing.”
But when her Liberal Party colleague, shadow home affairs minister Andrew Hastie, was asked on the ABC why the Coalition hadn’t listed the IRGC when it was in office, he suggested it should have been.
“That’s a good question. I was the chair of the intelligence committee. I was always keen to list it,” he said.
“I had a number of ministers who had direct interest in the work of the committee, from Home Affairs, Foreign Affairs, Defence and so on.
“Anyone who sat on the National Security Committee of Cabinet had an interest in what we did on the committee.
“It wasn’t listed, but here we are. The world has changed.”
Original Article published by Chris Johnson on Region Canberra.
