Australia had clear evidence that Prakash was not Fijian

It is now clear that Islamic State recruiter Neil Prakash is not a Fiji citizen and information has also emerged that Australian officials did not check with their Fijian counterparts before announcing that Prakash was a Fiji citizen.

Fiji has maintained all along since December that Prakash was not a citizen of our country.

Australian Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton [Photo: AAP]

Immigration Director Nemani Vuniwaqa had also questioned how Australia’s Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton can say that Neil Prakash is a Fijian Citizen when the Fijian Immigration Department has confirmed after checking its records that Prakash is not a Fijian citizen.

Neil Prakash who was linked to several Australian based attack plans and calls for lone wolf attacks against the US was born in Melbourne, Australia. He is believed to have left for Syria in 2013, where he changed his name to Abu Khaled al Cambodi and was put on a US kill list.

Prakash’s father is a Fijian of Indian descent while his mother is from Cambodia.

Nemani Vuniwaqa also confirms that Prakash has never entered Fiji.

Director of Immigration Nemani Vuniwaqa

The Guardian reports that the Australian government did not consult the Fijian government or any experts on Fijian law before determining that Prakash had ceased to be an Australian citizen because he was Fijian.

At a committee hearing, home affairs department officials revealed that the minister, Peter Dutton, relied solely on the Australian government’s own advice, despite what the shadow attorney general, Mark Dreyfus, described as clear evidence on the public record that Prakash was not Fijian.

The officials repeatedly refused to release advice on Prakash’s citizenship status and on the constitutionality of a bill to increase Dutton’s powers to strip people convicted of terrorist offences of Australian citizenship.

On 22nd November Dutton announced the government would seek to lower the threshold for revoking citizenship so that the minister would only need to be “reasonably satisfied” that a person would have another citizenship.

Commonwealth Counter‑terrorism Coordinator Linda Geddes

Linda Geddes, the commonwealth counter‑terrorism coordinator, said the department had not received any advice from an expert in Fijian citizenship law.

Asked if the government had taken any steps to verify with the Fijian government that Prakash was Fijian, Geddes replied: “No, no we did not.”

Prakash was captured in Turkey in 2016, and is now in a maximum security prison facing terrorism charges with potential sentences of up to 15 years in jail.

He is wanted by Australian authorities over his alleged role in two terrorism plots, including one to target Anzac Day services in Melbourne in 2015 and over his travel to Syria to fight with Isis.

He faces a potential life sentence if extradited and convicted in Australia.