David Shoebridge (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

From the outset, I want to be clear that the Greens support the Criminal Code Amendment (State Sponsors of Terrorism) Bill 2025. We support its core intent. The Greens have been on record for some two-and-a-bit years calling for the listing of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organisation. We've done that because we were listening to the community. We have close ties with the Iranian community in Australia and have worked with them, in particular, in their campaign, Woman, Life, Freedom, following the horrific killing of Jina Mahsa Amini. When you work with the Iranian community and you go to protests, speaking in support of the Woman, Life, Freedom campaign, they'll tell you about the fear inside the community, both in Iran and around the world, of the IRGC. The women in Iran are in fear for their freedom, for their physical safety and, as in the case of Jina Mahsa Amini, for their lives. They made it very clear to us that that was a core demand for them.

I also want to thank the Kurdish community in Australia for their advocacy in the matter too, and that has included their advocacy for the Woman, Life, Freedom campaign. The Kurdish community and other ethnic and religious groups inside Iran—there's diversity inside Iran—know the reality of persecution. They know the brutal reality of the IRGC. And we've put on record our concerns for the Kurdish community in Iran and the threats that they face. Of course, the killing of Jina Mahsa Amini was a part of that—a proud, strong Kurdish-Iranian woman targeted for how she looked and for her identity by a brutal terrorist grouping that terrorises the Iranian people. I do want to give credit as well to my colleague Senator Jordon Steele-John, who had the foreign affairs portfolio and did such a remarkably good job of it in the previous parliament. He stated on 13 September 2023:

Jina 'Mahsa' Amini's death sparked a wave of protests in Iran, and began the Woman Life Freedom movement globally. Over the past year people across the globe have been in solidarity with those targeted by the Iranian regime.

There continues to be unfair trials, egregious executions and continued removal of the rights of women and girls. Australia must maintain pressure on Iranian authorities to free peaceful protestors who are demanding freedom from their country.

Listing the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organisations would send a strong signal that Australia will not stay silent in the face of human rights abuses and will act to punish perpetrators who are accountable for these heinous crimes.

The Australian Greens continue their solidarity with the Iranian Diaspora community in Australia and their ongoing fight for freedom. Women, Life, Freedom.

But, of course, those calls were met by a wall of obfuscation from the government, who said: 'It's all too hard. Changing the law would be an incredibly complex job. You can't list the IRGC, because it's part of a government entity. You know—impossibility, impossibility, impossibility.' And we said at the time—and we weren't the only ones to say it at the time; I know the coalition said it—'We'll bring the legislation forward and it will pass, provided it's well crafted and does the job. Bring the legislation forward, and you've got a clear parliamentary pathway to it. Don't talk to us about the problems; talk to us about the solution.' And all we got was obfuscation and inaction, the government hiding behind the current laws and saying, 'Well, you can't do it, because the current laws don't allow for the listing of a government related entity.' But, of course, other countries, like the United States and European countries, have listed the IRGC and have the capacity to list government associated government entities as terrorist organisations. Again, we said: 'Well, just look at what the United States has done. Look at what other countries have done. They permit government entities to be identified as terrorist organisations.' In truth, on this planet, some of the largest terror organisations are government entities, delivering obscene violence. It's indiscriminate, or it's often targeted political violence against minorities. Some of the worst offenders on the planet are government entities. I just want to raise this.

Although this has been an issue now for more than two years—the Greens have been calling for it, civil society has been calling for it—this process was still rushed. Once again, the government rushed scrutiny of this bill and sent it to the PJCIS, whose final report, while endorsing the bill, fails to take into account a number of significant concerns raised in that process, including what can often be the unfair—and, I assume, unintended—impacts on humanitarian aid delivery.

It doesn't come just from the effects of this bill. Those concerns have been baked into the listing legislation since its inception. Aid organisations, including the Australian Council for International Development and Save the Children Australia have called for broad humanitarian exemptions consistent with UN council resolutions to provide regulatory certainty for Australian NGOs who are responding to global humanitarian crises. These are critically important concerns, and we call on the government to consider them and consider them further. Indeed, the Greens will be presenting amendments to this bill to provide for the protection of Australian NGOs who are working in areas which are under de facto control of listed organisations to allow them to work to provide critical humanitarian relief—food, medicine, housing, water.

When you talk to NGOs who are active in the international humanitarian space, they say that there is incredible legal risk to them in providing basic humanitarian relief and saving lives in conflict zones such as Afghanistan because of listings. They say that those concerns also arise in parts of Palestine and Gaza because of the listings. They say that those concerns also arise in other conflict zones such as Sudan, where we absolutely know that there is an urgent need for humanitarian aid. To punish the people on the ground, who are under the de facto control of a listed organisation, facing the brutality of that listed organisation—often with that comes famine, comes a lack of access to medicine, comes internal displacement—and to punish them twice and say, 'Not only are you under the de facto control of a terrorist organisation against your will and being held at ransom at that level; because of that, Australian aid organisations can't provide aid to you like the food that you need to feed your kids, the housing you need to protect yourself and the medicine,' is a double punishment.

I want to read onto the record my thanks for my chief of staff, Kym Chapple, who has done a huge amount of work in speaking with the NGOs, coming to grips with the submissions that went to PJCIS and helping my party bring forward amendments which we think would be critical for helping humanitarian organisations. Sometimes the work of our staff doesn't get noticed. I want to tell you this has been noticed.

We also note submissions to the inquiry from the Alliance for Journalists' Freedom, who recommended an inclusion to a specific exemption for journalism being undertaken in the public interest. Again, many of the concerns that apply to humanitarian organisations, who we want on the ground stopping people from starving, giving people access to clean water and helping people who are already being terrorised in these conflict zones—we also need journalists to be there to cover what's happening and to tell the truth about what's happening. Sometimes that requires engagement with these organisations, because that's the only way you can get access and maintain access. Journalists should also have a protection and a clear protection when they're engaged in public interest journalism. Because, unless we see the truth, how can we help? Again I say to the government, on behalf of my party: consider closely the amendments that are being brought in this space, because we have that obligation.

But now I want to address what we could describe as the elephant in the room. We are amending the law now to allow for government entities to be listed as terrorist entities under the law. By this bill's own criteria, the Israel Defense Forces, the IDF, would qualify for listing as a terrorist entity. The test is straightforward really: a foreign state entity that causes serious harm or death to Australian citizens to advance a political cause. Well, in April 2024, Australian aid worker Zomi Frankcom was killed in Gaza by an IDF airstrike on a clearly marked World Central Kitchen vehicle. I'll just repeat that. In April 2024, Australian aid worker Zomi Frankcom was killed in Gaza by an IDF airstrike on a clearly marked World Central Kitchen vehicle. In October 2025, Australians on the Gaza flotilla were detained by Israeli forces illegally, had their arms dislocated and heads slammed to the ground and were held in torture-like conditions. If those two points don't meet the test of serious harm under this law, then what does?

Let's pass this bill, and let's get on with listing the IRGC. But then let's list the Israeli Defence Force as a state sponsor of terrorism for their actions against Australians. And that doesn't count the obscenity of their actions against millions of Palestinians. No more double standards based on who our purported friends are. That's not justice. That's just politics dressed up as national security. Let's amend the law. Let's allow for state entities to be listed as terrorist organisations, and then let's look clearly at the world and see where the largest state directed terror organisations are. If you cast your eyes fairly across this planet asking, 'Which are the largest terrorist organisations that are state terrorist organisations?' and you don't see the IDF, then you're not looking.