Speaker 1: The conflict that is occurring in the Middle East has
Speaker 1: caused a great deal of grief for the Jewish community,
Speaker 1: for members of the Islamic Palestinian communities Australians.
Speaker 2: When the Australian government appointed its Envoy to combat Islamophobia,
Speaker 2: it came amid escalating violence in Gaza.
Speaker 1: Shortly we'll also be announcing an envoy on Islamophobia. That
Speaker 1: will be important as well.
Speaker 2: But scigns have emerged that the envoy chosen, Aftab Marlik,
Speaker 2: appears to see his role as separate from the conflict
Speaker 2: in the Middle East. Now there are questions about why
Speaker 2: Marlik was chosen and concern about whether his report, due
Speaker 2: to any day now, will go far enough to address
Speaker 2: Islamophobia in this country. I'm Ruby Jones and you're listening
Speaker 2: to seven AM today Craigy Reporter Danny said on the
Speaker 2: secret briefings the envoy is holding and the disquiet over
Speaker 2: how he's approaching his role. It's Monday, August eighteen, So
Speaker 2: you have been looking into the private briefings that the
Speaker 2: Special Envoy to Combat Islamophobia has been holding. It turns
Speaker 2: out with MPs as he prepares to make his report public,
Speaker 2: tell me how you found out that these briefings were happening.
Speaker 3: So we got a tip off from a stakeholder and
Speaker 3: from there it all snowboard. After Malik, the Special envo
Speaker 3: for Combating Islamophobia, we know, gave a series of briefings
Speaker 3: to federal MPs and canber in late July. He invited
Speaker 3: every member of the federal Upper and Lower House, and
Speaker 3: so we have a number of people that came to
Speaker 3: those meetings. We know that Green Senator David Tubridge, Independent
Speaker 3: Senator Adam mcpayman, Small Business Minister n L, Assistant Defense
Speaker 3: Minister Peter Khalil, the Shadow Attorney General Julian Lisa, the
Speaker 3: Assistant Citizenship Minister Julian Hill all attended these meetings. A
Speaker 3: number of people that spoke to us from those briefings,
Speaker 3: and they weren't just MPs, they were MP staffers as well.
Speaker 3: So there were a few people in these meetings told
Speaker 3: us that they were really surprised about the approach that
Speaker 3: Aftabmak took.
Speaker 2: Okay, so what was it exactly about his position that
Speaker 2: left people in the room surprised?
Speaker 3: He didn't mention the war in Gaza at all until
Speaker 3: he was prompted by an MP, and this was the
Speaker 3: most surprising part for pretty much everybody that I spoke to.
Speaker 3: Aftabmalak doesn't see Islamophobia is sort of immediately connected with
Speaker 3: the war in Gaza, and subsequently he draws this distinction
Speaker 3: between anti Palestinian racism and Islamophobia, and that's a position
Speaker 3: that is I'm not contested, but that's one of the
Speaker 3: key things that sort of came out of the meeting.
Speaker 2: Right, So he didn't mention Gaza until he was asked
Speaker 2: about it. But when he was asked, what did he say?
Speaker 3: He said that he was only responsible for looking into islamophobia.
Speaker 3: Those are the terms of his remit and he pointed
Speaker 3: to a public statement by the president of the Australia
Speaker 3: Palestine Advocacy Network NASA Mashni, and he said that this
Speaker 3: was the basis of his view. Then an MP got
Speaker 3: up and said, well, I've just spoken to NASA ma
Speaker 3: Ashni and that's not his view at all. He believes
Speaker 3: that anti Palestinian racism and Islamophobia are really intimately linked.
Speaker 3: So we spoke to NASA and NASA senter screenshots of
Speaker 3: conversations that he has with Afdab Malik where he really,
Speaker 3: really passionately implores Aftab Malik to consider that link, and
Speaker 3: he is really strident in that view, and he over
Speaker 3: a significant period of time implores af Tab Malik to
Speaker 3: consider that link. And at various points af Tab Malik
Speaker 3: is quite cautious in all of his language, and I
Speaker 3: would characterize him as being a quite circumspeaking, quite cautious
Speaker 3: individual in general.
Speaker 2: And so tell me a bit more than about Malik,
Speaker 2: who he is and how he ended up in this appointment.
Speaker 3: So he's a bureaucrat needs from the UK, is a
Speaker 3: British Pakistani Australian bureaucratination.
Speaker 4: And the ordinariness of it was what was very surprising,
Speaker 4: the fact that Islamophobia is taking place in very normal circumstances,
Speaker 4: in normal surroundings such as shopping malls, at the beaches,
Speaker 4: on the public transport, even in schools.
Speaker 3: And it was a criticism of him when he was
Speaker 3: appointed in the first place. There was a concern that
Speaker 3: someone from the UK wouldn't necessarily understand the Australian context,
Speaker 3: someone who wasn't here for the Cronulla riots, who wasn't
Speaker 3: here for christ Church, who wasn't here for nine to eleven,
Speaker 3: who wasn't here for the Tony Abbott era sort of
Speaker 3: stop the boat's discourse.
Speaker 4: We know from evidence that global events can directly lead
Speaker 4: to Islamophobia. I mean, for example, what what happened in
Speaker 4: Christchurch and twenty nineteen result in a fourfold increase of
Speaker 4: smophobia here in Australia that was committed by.
Speaker 3: What we do know is that he wasn't the government's
Speaker 3: first choice. We know that the government went to the
Speaker 3: like Savali Kadri, who is a teacher in Western Sydney,
Speaker 3: or Jamal Rifi, who is a really high profile supporter
Speaker 3: of Western Sydney Front bencher Tony Burke. We know that
Speaker 3: they went to at least four people and that has
Speaker 3: resulted in a number of issues. There's a view that
Speaker 3: he's a bureaucrat that has a background in combating terrors
Speaker 3: and counter terrorism. The view of that is that that
Speaker 3: stigmatizing work in the community, and that's not a universal view,
Speaker 3: but it's a significant view. This idea that employing a
Speaker 3: career bureaucrat is a conservative appointment and one that is
Speaker 3: deliberately conservative, and that the government is looking for someone
Speaker 3: to basically rub a stamp whatever social cohesion policies it
Speaker 3: might want to put through or not put through. So
Speaker 3: the government made a decision at some point that they
Speaker 3: wanted aftab Marlik in his style of research and community consultation.
Speaker 2: Coming up. Why Aft tab Marlik ended up with next
Speaker 2: to no staff, So, Danny, since the government made that
Speaker 2: decision to appoint Af tab Malik, what do we know
Speaker 2: about how his offer has been operating.
Speaker 3: There's a report in the Canberra Times at the end
Speaker 3: of July that said that his office was empty almost
Speaker 3: a year on from being appointed, and that he's been
Speaker 3: working with staff that have been secondered from the Home
Speaker 3: Affairs Department and that they've been shared with Gillian Siegel. Now,
Speaker 3: I spoke to a number of sources that were familiar
Speaker 3: with how that office works and the recruitment for it,
Speaker 3: and they told me that Muslims didn't want to work
Speaker 3: for this guy, not because they had problems with him,
Speaker 3: but because there was a federal election due and there
Speaker 3: were genuine fears that a Dutton led coalition government would
Speaker 3: abolish the office.
Speaker 5: And sorry, in terms of the on boy, look, if
Speaker 5: it's making a difference, if it's helping, then happy to
Speaker 5: continue it. But I think there's a lot of frustration
Speaker 5: at the moment about what is being listened to from
Speaker 5: what's being advised by the envoys.
Speaker 3: So obviously, the now former Opposition leader has a really
Speaker 3: long history of antagonistic remarks about the Muslim community, really
Speaker 3: really didn't have a strong relationship with them. He previously
Speaker 3: called Lemodes immigration to Australia or a mistake. He just last
Speaker 3: year he suggested banning refugees from Gaza. So there was
Speaker 3: a real concern that the office wouldn't exist if the
Speaker 3: Coalition won government. And he's now starting to recruit for
Speaker 3: the office. But it's almost been a year since he
Speaker 3: was appointed and he's had to do basically all of
Speaker 3: the work for himself outside of the minor secretarial work
Speaker 3: conducted by the Department of Home Affairs.
Speaker 2: Right, And as you've said, it seems like the Envoy
Speaker 2: is perhaps trying to distance his work from dealing with
Speaker 2: the domestic impacts of the war in Gaza. So what
Speaker 2: is he actually focusing on them? What has he said
Speaker 2: he wants to see come out of this process.
Speaker 3: We know that the question of media coverage is a
Speaker 3: touch point for him because he said so in a
Speaker 3: slide that we've seen from his press. But as we
Speaker 3: know in this country, changing the media narrative is a
Speaker 3: very vague policy prescription, so we don't know what that's
Speaker 3: going to look like, and we don't know how that's
Speaker 3: going to be actionable. He talks about promoting public awareness
Speaker 3: and understanding of the impacts of Islamophobia, and that same
Speaker 3: PowerPoint slide that I just mentioned a success for him
Speaker 3: looks like and I'm quoting here, and this is the
Speaker 3: extent of which he's described it. Government accepts recommendations change
Speaker 3: media landscape, cultural shift, so there's not a lot of
Speaker 3: detail here.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so it sounds like there was an opportunity here
Speaker 2: for something that did really grapple with Islamophobia in Australia,
Speaker 2: and there is this fear now that that won't happen,
Speaker 2: that won't be a case the case. So I suppose,
Speaker 2: as we wait to see what is in this report,
Speaker 2: what do you think could actually work?
Speaker 3: I think the key to the the report being meaningful
Speaker 3: for Muslim Australians is a move away from these buzzwords
Speaker 3: social cohesion, interfaith dialogue, research development round tables. The fear
Speaker 3: is that this report will be less concrete than it
Speaker 3: perhaps needs to be. The fear is that we're going
Speaker 3: to have another call as we sort of so often
Speaker 3: have had since nine to eleven, really for interfaith dialogue,
Speaker 3: for community consultation, for more research, and that's not necessarily
Speaker 3: what community leaders want now. The uptick in Islamophobia is extraordinary,
Speaker 3: and it remains to be over the last two years
Speaker 3: or so. So what I think the Muslim community want
Speaker 3: fundamentally is when more enforcement receive those complaints that they
Speaker 3: are seen to be and that they do take them seriously.
Speaker 3: But beyond that, the idea is perhaps something just more
Speaker 3: concrete than those buzzwords that we keep seeing. There might
Speaker 3: be a school of thought out there that and this
Speaker 3: may be the case with aftab Malik, that we simply
Speaker 3: need to actually be doing all of these different buzzwords.
Speaker 3: We need to actually commit to innovate dialogue, and we
Speaker 3: haven't been doing them so thus far. But I dare
Speaker 3: say from the people that I've spoken to in the
Speaker 3: Muslim community, they're a little bit tired of dinners and
Speaker 3: round tables.
Speaker 2: Well, Dannie, thank you so much for your time and
Speaker 2: for your reporting on this.
Speaker 3: Thank you very much, Ruby, thanks for having me.
Speaker 2: You can read Danny say It's reporting at craggy dot
Speaker 2: com dot aqu Also in the news today, eight, Prime
Speaker 2: Minister Anthony Alberesi said Russia's invasion of Ukraine must not
Speaker 2: be rewarded after the Trump Putin summit ended with no
Speaker 2: ceasefire deal made. Trump and Putin met in Alaska on
Speaker 2: Saturday for what had been expected to be a historic
Speaker 2: summit discussing potentially ending the war in Ukraine. After a
Speaker 2: meeting that lasted for nearly three hours, the pair ended
Speaker 2: their conversations early and without a ceasefire agreement. Anthony Alberizi
Speaker 2: said the Australian government wanted a ceasefire and the sovereignty
Speaker 2: of Ukraine protected. And the Islamic Council of Victoria has
Speaker 2: reported an increase in Islamophobia, warning that the number of
Speaker 2: victims is likely far higher than reported. On Saturday, the
Speaker 2: Council held its first conference on Islamophobia, with politicians, police,
Speaker 2: religious leaders and academics among those in attendance at the
Speaker 2: event in Melbourne. In a report released to coincide with
Speaker 2: the conference, it estimated more than eighty five percent of
Speaker 2: Islamophobia incidents were not reported. I'm Ruby Jones seven am
Speaker 2: see you tomorrow,