Mission & Justice

David Marr; 23/9/08

The Haneef inquiry emerged briefly into daylight yesterday to hear the former chief justice Sir Gerard Brennan express concern that security laws are causing “too great an erosion of our fundamental rights”.Sir Gerard was speaking at a forum examining what he called the “novel” and “drastic” anti-terrorism laws used to detain and interrogate the Gold Coast doctor Mohamed Haneef for 12 days in July last year. Dr Haneef was charged with terrorism offences but these charges were later dropped. A former judge, John Clarke, QC, is conducting an inquiry into the fiasco.

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1/9/09

The Australian Federal Police Commissioner, Mick Keelty, should stand down pending the outcome of the Clarke Inquiry into the handling of the Haneef case, the Australian Lawyers Alliance said yesterday. Its national president, Clara Davies, said the AFP declaration that terrorism suspect Mohamed Haneef was “no longer a person of interest”, while welcome, was disturbing. Dr Haneef had been forced to endure more than 12 months of false accusation after his arrest at Brisbane Airport on July 2, 2007 when his mobile phone SIM card was linked to botched terrorism attacks in Britain.

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Paul Maley; 26/7/08

Australian Federal Police withheld documents from Mohamed Haneef’s legal team, including an interview transcript revealing officers repeatedly ignored the Indian-born doctor’s indications he wanted a lawyer in the moments after his arrest at Brisbane airport. Dr Haneef’s legal team claim the AFP could have broken the law by failing to provide five records of interview taken as police were arresting Dr Haneef on July 2 last year, and in the first few days of his 25-day detention. They accuse AFP officers of failing to provide Dr Haneef with a lawyer despite repeated indications from Dr Haneef that he wanted one present. Dr Haneef was arrested in Brisbane after police linked his mobile phone SIM card to botched terror attacks in Britain.

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Paul Maley & Angus Hohenboken; 19/6/08

Australian Federal Police withheld key pieces of evidence that would have helped exonerate Mohamed Haneef and instead presented courts and prosecutors with information that was selective and riddled with factual inaccuracies. In a paper summarising the Haneef legal team’s submission to the Clarke inquiry into the arrest and detention of the Indian-born doctor, his barrister, Stephen Keim SC, said he and colleagues were “startled” by the number of factual inaccuracies they encountered when compiling the submission. “Every major attempt by government agencies to place known facts on the record appeared fraught with error,” Mr Keim said. Dr Haneef was arrested at Brisbane International Airport as he tried to board a plane to India on July 2 after police linked his mobile phone SIM card to botched terror attacks in Britain. His visa was cancelled by then immigration minister Kevin Andrews just hours after a Brisbane magistrate granted him bail on a single terror charge on July 16.

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Paul Maley; 10/6/08

Police had only a “vague notion” of how to apply counter-terror powers when they arrested Mohamed Haneef, and justified his prolonged detention on the basis it was “better to be safe than sorry”, according to the Law Council of Australia. In its submission to the Clarke inquiry into last year’s abandoned prosecution of Dr Haneef, the Law Council has condemned the conduct of police and former immigration minister Kevin Andrews, whom it accuses of improperly influencing the judiciary by cancelling Dr Haneef’s visa.  A spokeswoman for the inquiry said all the relevant parties - the Australian Federal Police, ASIO, the Department of Immigration, the Attorney-General and Dr Haneef’s legal team - had lodged submissions.  The Law Council’s submission contends that the authorities took the assumption that “police were not only authorised to, but in fact obliged to detain Dr Haneef until they had definitively ascertained he was not involved in the attack.”

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Paul Maley; 31/5/08

Federal investigators used special star chamber powers to force a close friend of Mohamed Haneef to give evidence in a secret five-day interrogation by the Australian Crime Commission at the height of the anti-terror investigation last year. The Weekend Australian can reveal that just 24 hours before prosecutors were forced to drop the charge against Dr Haneef, allowing him to leave the country days later, Mohammed Asif Ali was called before the commission and questioned extensively amid concerns about his links to Dr Haneef, his medical qualifications and suspicious material found on his computer. Dr Haneef was arrested at Brisbane airport as he was attempting to leave the country on July 2 on suspicions he was involved in two foiled terror attacks in London and Glasgow, Scotland.

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Natalie O’Brien; 27/5/08

The former head of spy agency ASIO, Dennis Richardson, warned US authorities that Canberra could not agree to their transferring Mamdouh Habib to Egypt at least a week before the Sydney man was “kidnapped” and sent to the North African country, where he was subjected to months of torture. The current head of ASIO, Paul O’Sullivan, revealed during a Senate estimates hearing yesterday that his predecessor, Mr Richardson, was per-sonally involved in discussions with the US State Department and the intelligence community about the “hypothetical” possibility of Mr Habib being taken to Egypt. “The director-general of ASIO informed the US au-thorities that it was not the Australian government policy position to engage in practices of rendition,” Mr O’Sullivan said.

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13/5/08

The federal government has set aside an extra $2.2 million to fund the inquiry into the police handling of the Mohamed Haneef case. Dr Haneef was arrested at Brisbane airport last year in connection with failed terrorist attacks in the UK. He was later released following a series of investigative bungles by the Australian Federal Police and Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions. Budget papers show the total cost of the inquiry is likely to be about $4.2 million, with $2 million of that coming from the existing budget of the Attorney-General’s Department.

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Andrew Fraser;, 12/5/08,
Lawyers have presented a united front in a growing battle with the Rudd Government over access to documents that they claim are vital to the truth of the Mohamed Haneef affair being exposed. The Queensland Law Society has backed the former terror suspect’s legal team, which claims the Immigration Department is denying it documents needed for the inquiry ordered by the Rudd Government into the bungled case. Queensland Law Society president Megan Mahon has written to Attorney-General Robert McClelland disputing the Government’s argument that a royal commission for the inquiry into the Haneef matter was not necessary as all parties were co-operating with the Clarke inquiry, which began at the start of the month.

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