Wednesday 5 October 2022 11:43 PM ISIS bride plan slammed by Sydney Assyrian community trends now
Anthony Albanese's government has been slammed by a western Sydney community over plans to repatriate the family members of ISIS fighters.
Under the plans, stranded Islamic State brides and their children will be allowed to return to Australia - reversing a years-long ban by the Australian government.
The women left Australia to join their husbands fighting for the Islamist terrorist movement before it collapsed in March 2019.
However, members of western Sydney's largest Assyrian community in Fairfield, many whom fled Syria and Iraq to escape ISIS, have hit out at the government's change of policy.
'ISIS raped our women and burned down our churches and homes,' said Fairfield Deputy Mayor Reni Barkho, an Assyrian who migrated to Australia in 1994 and has several family members who escaped ISIS.
'We can never forgive or forget or welcome those that travelled to help persecute us in our own homes in Iraq and Syria.
Fairfield Deputy Mayor and Assyrian immigrant Reni Barkho (right) has slammed the plan to bring Aussie ISIS brides back
Assyrians are a mostly Christian ethnic minority who have faced persecution by Islamic State
'We are grateful that Australia provided us refuge, but Prime Minister Albanese should not be bringing back anyone who chose to support ISIS back to our community.'
Assyrians are a mostly Christian ethnic minority who have faced persecution by Islamic State.
In 2015, ISIS attacked the Assyrian village of Tel Tamr in northeastern Syria, killing 64 defenders and kidnapping 231 men, women, and children while also destroying 11 churches.
Tony Abbott's government then issued 12,000 visas to religious minorities fleeing ISIS, with the
