How ASIO’s pursuit of people smugglers really works

Hello, is Ali there?

Hello?

Hello?

Is that Ali?

Yes? Hello, Sir Ali? Is this lovely gentle, kind of natured man?

Oh yeah today, Hi, I'm very good.

How are you my friend?

Oh?

Not too bad, not too bad, just passed live.

My name is Mark and I'm the so.

Ali Jafari was an Afghan refugee who fled the Taliban regime.

In Afghanistan in nineteen ninety nine.

He was twenty six years old when he left, and he left behind his wife and three sons. Flew to Indonesia and then boarded a smuggle of vessel to Australia, where he intended to seek asylum.

Enough of love they gave me for protection maser for three years.

He then sponsored his family to join him in Australia, and they were overjoyed to be reunited in Australia in twenty ten, and so that had been eleven years apart. Shortly after that, Ali's wife gave birth to their fourth son, and so things were going really well form them, or so they thought.

It is very hard live. It's very hard live. What can I say to you? Sally is far away? What can I do?

From Schwartz Media, I'm Ruby Jones This is seven AM. When Ali Jafari's permanent resident visa was suddenly canceled twelve years ago, he was stuck in Pakistan, separated from his

Thank you for coming on the show, Thanks for having me.

You're here to talk about the case of Ali Jafari, who came to Australia was later joined by his family who all settled here, but then had his visa canceled. So tell me what happened.

So, after a few months in immigration detention, he was given a temporary protection visa and then later permanent residency and he opened a grocery store in Western Sydney with his friend's side Akbar Jafari.

I received a call from the someone Dasa from part.

Of Ali had applied from the Shlian citizenship, so the Department of Immigration invited him to attend an interview for that citizenship.

I say from where they say from the Paramatta Magresha. When I go there, I see the Azio Police or PEPs. I don't know about it.

But when he arrived at the offices of the Department of Immigration, it turned out to be a surprise interrogation by two plane closed ASIO officers.

So what did ASIO allege that Ali had done?

So this friend Saija Jafari, who I mentioned before their business relationship. That relationship between Ali and Say became the center of an ASIO investigation into suspected people smuggling activities. ASIO suspected that Ali had been a part of this people smuggling syndicate that was based in Indonesia. So the allegation is he would prefer a person who wanted to use the smuggling syndicates, so they probably want to try

Right, what do we know about that interrogation?

What was said?

So they immediately identify themselves to Ali, and they're clear that the purpose of the interview was for a security assessment, which they say is part of the citizenship process, and over the course of that to our interview, they.

Asked more than a thousand questions.

The court documents say there was no lawyer present to represent Ali, and at no point the Asier officers advising and to obtain legal representation. Ali wasn't literate in English, but he did speak English. There was an interpreter present, but having read the Asier transcript of the interview, he didn't rely on the interpreter, and so he claims that he didn't know what Asia was at the time and didn't understand the serious of the situation.

You say, no, you have to talk to after something like that. I don't know. I don't know about the police they pictor I don't know about it.

And you can imagine he's been in the country for you know, ten years, just working in a shop. I'm sure he wouldn't have understood exactly what was going on in that scenario.

They bushed him too, me no.

You say.

At the end of the interview, Ali asked the officers if the interview was legal, and they admitted that using the disguise of a in bracket citizenship interview could be quite misleading, but this was quote regular practice. So after the interview, it was the following year, while Ali was abroad in Pakistan, he was visiting his mother. The Director General of ASIO issued him with an averse security assessment which says they suspected is a threat to national security

And Ali's been in Pakistan ever since.

And what about Ali's family, Yeah.

I mean Ali's family were left behind. Ali's wife had a breakdown and she shruggled to cope with his being away, and so it was left to his son Say to kind of support the family. He was finishing his high school certificate, he was working part time. The family relied on his income to survive. But it was also up to Ali's sun Say to kind of work out what had happened to him, and how they could challenge that legally. So he'd been in the country for three years at

After the break, Ali's sons fight to get their father home. So Mark talked to me more about the legal process after Ali's visa was canceled by the Immigration minister.

So the first thing I would say is that the way they were notified of the visa cancelation was the family received the letter in the mail and they were then expected to call Ali to tell him what had happened, and they had to tell him that he would be refused immigration clearents and removed from the country if he tried to come back to Australia. Ali hired a solicitor, Jeremy Sita and he applied for a merit's review of Ali's security assessment. It took two years before court proceedings

There.

They went through this court case, but when they arrived in court, the family discovered that the evidence behind the security assessment was deemed confidential and would only be revealed that a closed hearing, and that would be without the

Right, So the evidence that ASIO used to support its case that Ali Jafari was involved in people smuggling, that evidence Ali has never seen it and his legal team has never seen it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And interestingly, when the Tribe you don't made their decision, they acknowledged that there wasn't enough of a case in the kind of open evidence, which means the evidence that Ali's legal team were able to see, and that the thrust of the argument made by asio's council was in the section that was confidential.

I mean, it seems pretty unusual and also unfair to have evidence used against you that you can't contest because you can't see it.

Yeah, certainly.

I mean it goes against the foundational concepts of justice that you're innocent until proven guilty and that you get a fair trial. Yeah.

So, to be clear, Ali has actually not been convicted of people smuggling.

No, He's never been convicted of people smuggling. And asio's job isn't to convict people of smuggling. But Australian law has made the offensive people smuggling into one of the most serious criminal offenses.

The government will introduce new bills into Parliament today to beef up Asio's powers, allowing it now to go after people smuggling, syndicates and criminals.

The Labor government in two ten that gave as the power to investigate suspected smugglers, provide security assessments and then based on those security assessments, can cancel their visas they can be placed in immigration detention or deported without criminal trial.

The law enforcement response of this government is more substantial than any other peacetime government in terms of border protection, more boats on the water, more planes in the air, stronger law enforcement powers, as well as working increasingly cooperatively with our neighbors.

And so that allows is Showing government.

To avoid, I think, to go through the expensive and often difficult process of charging someone with the criminal offense. And in Ali's case, the cancelation of his visa while he was a broad in Pakistan, which is quite a unique case, the one that I've only I hadn't come across other than Ali. That allowed them to avoid keeping him in immigration detention indefinitely. So it was a far cheaper, far less difficult process for the Showing government to handle.

So Ali is in Pakistan still, how is he doing?

I mean, he is despondent about the future. There's very few legal avenues open for him to try and get back to Australia. He would have to essentially rely on a change of security assessment from Asia and then from there be able to apply for another visa to Australia, and the chances of that happening seem.

To be quite low.

He's been away from his family for almost twelve years now. He's unable to work due to his not being a citizen of Pakistan, and he's fearful of being targeted by extremist groups, being arrested, of being deported to Taliban ruled Afghanistan, which is increasingly happening in Pakistan at the moment to Afghan refugees, and so he survives on the money that his children sent home to him.

He is very hard life, so you know, very hard life is yet is very dune jet in Pakistan too.

And since then his children have been quite prominent in Australians. One of them was a professional boxer and another side Ada was involved in community welfare programs helping refugees and asylum seekers settle in the community through sports and other programs.

My son, my wife, all my family upset is very hard life.

For me ahead yes said and his family. They miss their dad a lot.

So he doesn't like to talk about him at home because it upsets his mum and he wants to be strong.

For his mum and his brothers.

But he remains determined for justice and so he wants people to know how unfair this has been. But he's also seeking a way to get his father back to Australia and I don't know if that will be possible.

Mark, Thank you so much for your time.

Thank you, thanks for having.

Also in the news today, Green's leader Adam Bann is projected to lose his seat of Melbourne to Labour's Sarah Whitty after a tight count that stretched several days. It marks the second political leader to be ousted at the election. Meanwhile, Independent Zoe Daniel has also lost her seat of Goldstein to Liberal Tim Wilson, and in Kuyong in Melbourne's Inner East, independent incumbent Manique Ryan has a slim edge over Liberal