‘Just the way I am': Labor mayor's long list of political and criminal connections
Jim Memeti's influence extends from the semi-professional National Premier League and surrounding municipality of Greater Dandenong – where he is in his sixth stint as mayor – to Spring Street and Canberra.
Memeti has long been welcome in the parliamentary offices of select federal and state Labor MPs and ministers who leverage off the Balkans-born chicken shop mogul's status as an Albanian community powerbroker to secure votes.
Support has flowed two ways. In late 2023, Memeti successfully lobbied state Labor and his own council for $700,000 in taxpayer funds to improve the home ground of his beloved Thunder, having already helped to extract a $700,000 commitment from federal Labor to build an Albanian community centre in Dandenong.
Two-and-a-half weeks before police raided Thunder's headquarters, Memeti travelled to Canberra where he met Prime Minister Anthony Albanese as part of a Parliamentary Friends of Albania function at Parliament House attended by two of his closest federal Labor colleagues, ministers Julian Hill and then-attorney-general Mark Dreyfus.
But on December 12, it was those in Memeti's non-political circles that had captured the interest of police and caused his phone to start buzzing.
Police not only raided Thunder's headquarters but swooped on three homes, arresting Memeti's son-in-law, his son-in-law's brother and the mayor's nephew.
The trio were targeted over police suspicions they were using inside information to bet on the outcome of two games in 2024 lost by Thunder against underdogs, confirmed by this masthead to be the St Albans Saints and Moreland City FC.
During the raids, detectives also discovered small bags of cocaine, a hydroponic cannabis crop and banned anabolic steroids.
It wasn't the first time Memeti's phone had rung with news that authorities were accusing men he knew of serious wrongdoing.
Eleven months earlier, in late January 2024, NSW counter-organised crime detectives busted drug trafficker Stase Ognenov with three kilograms of cocaine he had collected after driving north from his Dandenong home.
Police soon made a curious discovery. Ognenov, who had done almost five years' jail time in the late 1990s for heroin trafficking, was a tenant in one of Memeti's investment properties.
After checking his phone records, police also uncovered that Ognenov was in contact with Memeti, including during the trip to NSW that culminated in his arrest.
Nine months later, during a separate investigation, other men known to Memeti fell into the law-enforcement frame.
In October 2024, Victoria Police's criminal proceeds squad used unexplained wealth legislation to seize millions of dollars of property belonging to a father-and-son duo, Fari and Ferdi Lumanovski.
The mayor had previously helped Fari stave off deportation, vouching for him in a statement aired during a migration tribunal hearing in 2019. Despite being advised of Fari's serious criminal past, Memeti advised the Administrative Appeals Tribunal that Fari was a good guy deserving of a second chance.
At the time Victoria Police launched still-ongoing proceeds of crime action targeting the Lumanovskis, Fari's son, Ferdi, was known to Memeti not just via his father but due to Ferdi's role as the president of Dandenong Thunder.
Ferdi was leading the club when it received the taxpayer funding for which Memeti had lobbied, and can be seen posing in pictures with the mayor and Labor politicians in October 2023.
Other Albanian men targeted by law enforcement appear in other political happy snaps.
In a photo taken last year, Memeti can be seen posing with federal Labor MP Cassandra Fernando and Albanian criminal Emiljan Hamataj, who was arrested in mid-2021 by federal police for money laundering and cannabis production. He was convicted in January.
When Memeti travelled to Canberra to meet the prime minister with a delegation of senior Albanian-Australian leaders, a small number of less-savoury community members tagged along.
A video unearthed by this masthead shows a man suspected by law enforcement to be at the upper echelons of Albanian organised crime in Australia shaking hands with Albanese. There is no suggestion Albanese knew the man.
When Memeti was quizzed by this masthead about his proximity to suspected crime figures, he dismissed it as a byproduct of being a leader in an ethnic community with significant socio-economic challenges.
'I believe in trying to support people and rehabilitate people and give people second chances ... that's just been the way I am,' Memeti explains.
'I'm a figure that people trust. People want support … [and] come to me at their worst times.'
But his links to state and federal police targets has stoked concern inside law enforcement agencies, according to confidential sources who spoke to this masthead on the condition of anonymity.
There is no suggestion that Memeti has any involvement in, or knowledge of, suspected organised crime activity, but confidential sources in law enforcement and the local Albanian community are querying whether Memeti's influence has been exploited by some in his community.
The concern is amplified by warnings circulated by Australia's peak criminal intelligence agency, the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission, that the Albanian mafia has strategically rorted Australia's migration system for more than a decade to build powerful criminal enterprises, especially in South Australia and Victoria.
ACIC has also warned that Balkans crime gangs have successfully corrupted officials in Albania.
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In interviews with this masthead, Memeti stressed he knew nothing about Albanian organised criminal activity in Australia. He said that in assisting men like Fari Lumanovski, he was simply fulfilling his role as 'the only Albanian slash politician/councillor that can actually help anybody in the community'.
The mayor said he had sought the help of federal Labor politicians to get 'a couple of old [Albanian] ladies' visas, but that this was merely an expected duty of local councillors.
Yet two others who have served with Memeti on council told this masthead they believed Memeti's activities, including his support of Fari Lumanovski and Dandenong Thunder, deserved scrutiny.
Fari Lumanovski was marked for deportation in 2018, after Home Affairs officials discovered he had lied about his criminal convictions in the Balkans.
According to tribunal records, Lumanovski's 'substantial' criminal track record in the corruption-plagued region included convictions for kidnapping and counterfeiting money.
Migration tribunal files reveal that Lumanovski also used a fake document to cover up his overseas criminal past and prison sentences, and had historical charges in Victoria for possessing an illegal handgun and almost two dozen packets of a prescribed medicine commonly used to produce narcotics.
Lumanovski's past didn't dissuade Memeti from using his status as a local government official to vouch for Lumanovski's character.
In a written character reference, Memeti said that he had known Lumanovski 'since 2014 through regular attendances at his cafe in Dandenong' and that Lumanovski's extended 'family were well known to him through his regular contact with the Albanian community'.
Despite being advised of Lumanovski's 'numerous criminal convictions', Memeti described him in a statement tendered to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal in 2019 as a 'a person of generally good character' and 'a respected member of the Albanian community'.
Asked by this masthead about why he had backed Fari Lumanovski, Memeti downplayed his relationship with the businessman, saying he did not 'know him personally'.
'I know him only through the community,' Memeti said, explaining that he had offered to vouch for Fari because 'his wife was crying … and I did a reference for her'.
He said helping people was not only part of his nature but part of his job.
'Normally, you go to people and you ask them to support you, to vote for you. When time comes, sometimes they come to me with state issues, federal issues, local government issues,' Memeti said.
Memeti, an ethnic Albanian born in the North Macedonian village of Keshave, arrived in Australia aged two and bought his first poultry shop 17 years later, building an empire of almost two dozen chicken outlets and multiple investment properties.
His local government career began with his election to council in 2005 and elevation to mayor in 2010.
It's true that Memeti has helped others in trouble and his success as a businessman and politician in Dandenong, which has one of the highest Albanian populations in the country, has made him a magnet for those seeking help.
When Albanian Prparim Rustemovski was convicted for low-level cocaine trafficking in November 2019 and sentenced to two months' jail (which he had served on remand) and an 18-month community corrections order, the court heard how the mayor had 'provided a reference for you, in which he states that you worked hard for him' in a chicken shop previously owned by Memeti.
As for his connection with heroin and cocaine trafficker Stase Ognenov, Memeti explains it is no more than 'a tenant-landlord relationship'.
Memeti said that was likely why he spoke on the phone with Ognenov around the time he had arrived in NSW to pick up a package of cocaine in January 2024.
'He used to call me every now and then for different things [to do with the property Ognenov rented from him].' Memeti said he had spoken to Ognenov only once since he had been jailed in NSW.
Memeti said that that his 'very close' relationship with the Dandenong Thunder soccer club – which was founded by Albanian migrants in Dandenong and which formally endorsed Memeti's 2024 mayoral race – flowed from his work as mayor and community leader.
In October 2023, when state Labor minister Gabrielle Williams and MP Lee Tarlamis appeared at a media event to announce the $700,000 funding to upgrade of Thunder's main pitch, Memeti was pictured in local media reports with them alongside his son-in-law, Burim Muedenovski, who at the time was the club's vice president.
With Muedenovski in the picture was Ferdi Lumanovski, then-club president.
Memeti and his Labor colleagues didn't know it, but at the time of the photo, both Muedenovski and Ferdi were the focus of intense police attention due to the pair's association with figures suspected to be involved in Albanian organised crime.
One Albanian community insider has confided to this masthead that he told detectives he feared Dandenong Thunder had been infiltrated by Albanian crime figures.
In late 2024, police moved on both men. Ferdi's assets, including a Lamborghini Huracan, were seized by the police's proceeds of crime squad.
In a statement, Victoria Police confirmed that the seizure was 'part of an investigation into unexplained wealth', sparking an ongoing process that now requires Ferdi and his father, Fari, to convince the County Court they lawfully acquired 'three residential properties and two vehicles, a Lamborghini and a Mercedes Benz, worth at least $2.8 million'.
'As the matter is currently before the courts, it would be inappropriate to comment further,' a police spokesperson said.
The Lumanovskis could not be reached for comment and there is no suggestion by this masthead they are guilty of any offence.
A few weeks later after the seizure action, police swooped on Muedenovski.
He was targeted as one of three men, including Memeti's nephew, Jeton, and Burim's brother, Enis, suspected of using inside information to bet on games in which Thunder lost against weaker rivals: the St Albans Saints in July 2024 and the Moreland City FC last August.
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Police have laid no match-fixing or betting charges, and there is no suggestion the trio are guilty of the suspected sports corruption being probed.
But during the raids, detectives made other discoveries: several small bags of cocaine and hydroponic cannabis crop inside Enis' home; and 29 vials of banned anabolic steroids in Burim's garage.
In late March, the two brothers pleaded guilty but escaped convictions. Burim is still facing charges laid by the Australian Border Force over allegedly smuggling 45,000 cigarettes into Australia.
Quizzed about the police targeting of his son-in-law, Memeti said he had little recent contact with him: 'You don't pick people who is your family, but you're very disappointed anyway.'
Memeti also revealed that, in the aftermath of the police raids on Thunder's headquarters, Burim and Ferdi had both left their official roles as the club's two top officials. (After the raid, Thunder released a statement saying it was 'deeply concerned by allegations connected to our club' and would 'fully co-operate with Victoria Police's investigation'.)
Memeti didn't respond to written questions about why he was pictured with accused Albanian criminal Emiljan Hamataj and federal Labor MP Cassandra Fernando, but Fernando's spokesperson said on Friday the photo was at a lunch 'at Cr Memeti's house during the 2024 Victorian local government elections' and that she 'does not recall meeting the man in question nor being introduced to him at the lunch or at any other time'.
A source aware of the lunch said it was held to thank volunteers who had helped with Memeti's re-election campaign.
There is no suggestion of wrongdoing on the part of Fernardo or Memeti's other Labor colleagues, including federal MPs Dreyfus and Hill.
There is also no suggestion Albanese or any other politician knew the backgrounds of those who were part of the recent Albanian-Australian delegation to Canberra, including the suspected high-ranking Albanian mafia figure.
Dreyfus did not respond to specific questions about his dealings with Memeti, including whether Dreyfus' electorate office had provided assistance in specific migration matters, but said in a general statement that it was 'standard practice' for electorate offices to assist with visa matters.
Hill pointed to Memeti's long tenure in public office when asked about their dealings.
'Jim's been mayor of Greater Dandenong six times over 20 years and is well known and active across the entire community,' he said.
'Jim's dealings with me and my office over many years have always been entirely routine and focused on our community.'
When this masthead recently bumped into Memeti at Canberra airport, the six-time mayor insisted again that his brushes with those linked to suspected serious crime were incidental. As he had said in earlier interviews, Memeti vowed to keep helping people in need.
'That's just the way I am,' he said.
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SBS Australia
an hour ago
- SBS Australia
This lawyer once felt optimistic war crimes would be punished. Now he's not so sure
In the home of former war crimes prosecutor Graham Blewitt, a striking artwork offers a glimpse into the atrocities the retired Sydney-based lawyer has helped investigate. The piece hanging in Blewitt's home office shows a framed map of Bosnia and Herzegovina, painted over with gravestones marking the location of war crimes and a genocide, which he prosecuted in the 1990s. Barbed wire lines the border: a symbol of the concentration camps there that shocked the world. The paper is stained red for the blood of thousands that were massacred during the Yugoslav Wars. Painted barbed wire, gravestones and monuments over the map of Bosnia and Herzegovina are a poignant reminder of the atrocities that occurred there. The artwork was gifted to Graham Blewitt as he concluded his decade-long tenure as deputy prosecutor of the ICTY. Source: SBS News / Alexandra Jones The work is a glimpse into Blewitt's decade-long tenure as the deputy prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY). The tribunal was the first to investigate international war crimes after former Nazi leaders were tried at Nuremberg, and Japanese leaders at Tokyo, following World War Two. Its successes helped establish the permanent International Criminal Court (ICC) in 2002. "It's something I'm very proud of being involved in," Blewitt says. During the Bosnian War, the country's capital Sarajevo was under siege for nearly four years. An estimated 14,000 people including more than five thousand civilians were killed. Source: SBS News / Alexandra Jones But becoming a pioneer wasn't something the 78-year-old set out to do. "I got into war crimes accidentally," Blewitt says, recalling how he found himself investigating Nazi collaborators who had come to Australia after World War Two. After securing his first job in the office of the director of Public Prosecutions, Blewitt says the transition from "ordinary crime" to "war crime" was not that large a leap. "In many ways, the crimes that constitute war crimes were murders, rapes, ordinary criminal activity, except they were committed in the context of an armed conflict … and on a much larger scale," he says. After a career spent seeking justice for victims and more than a decade investigating war crimes, Blewitt now finds himself watching others struggle to enforce international criminal law in his footsteps. What's happening today throughout the world is a complete disappointment. Graham Blewitt's experiences in war crimes investigations and prosecutions are documented in two published books. Source: SBS News / Alexandra Jones Nazis in Australia Blewitt started investigating war crimes in 1988, after being recruited to Australia's Special Investigations Unit (SIU) set up by the Hawke government to investigate suspected Nazi collaborators living in Australia. He became the unit's director in 1991 and investigated Australians accused of being involved in mass executions of the Jewish population, mainly in Ukraine. This included gathering testimonies from persons in Canada, the United States, Israel and Europe. We undertook investigations by going to those areas, interviewing survivors, interviewing witnesses who were still there and those who had become refugees after the war. More than 500 people in Australia were investigated, but many had already died, others died during the course of investigations, and many allegations couldn't be substantiated due to a lack of available evidence. In the end, three people were charged under Australia's War Crimes Act 1945: Ivan Polyukhovich, Heinrich Wagner, and Mikolay Berezovsky. Polyukhovich was accused of helping massacre more than 850 Jews in the northern Ukrainian village of Serniki. Next, Blewitt says, came a world first. "We sent forensic teams [to Ukraine] and exhumed bodies in the mass graves from the 1940s," he says. "None of the other units throughout the world investigating war crimes, including the United States, Canada, England, Scotland and Germany, had ever undertaken a mass grave exhumation. "But we did, and the forensic evidence was overwhelming. It corroborated the evidence of the witnesses that we had found." The SIU exhumation team counting bodies at the Serniki mass grave in Ukraine, in June/July 1990. The team recovered German-manufactured bullet cases, date-stamped 1941. The SIU's photographs and artefacts from the mass graves were donated to the Sydney Jewish Museum. Source: Supplied Although none of the prosecutions resulted in convictions, Blewitt says the forensic evidence was not challenged. Polyukhovich stood trial in South Australia but was acquitted by a jury. Charges against Wagner were withdrawn due to his health, and there was not enough evidence to take Berezovsky to trial. The work of the SIU was wrapped up in 1992, and the unit then transitioned into the War Crimes Prosecution Support Unit, which was also dismantled in 1994. Despite its discontinuation, Blewitt says, the SIU's work was groundbreaking in the field of war crimes investigations. "It was an important piece of work for Australian legal history and it also gave me the confidence and the experience that I could apply when I got to The Hague later on," he says. Graham Blewitt visited the Serniki mass grave site in December 1992, three years after the exhumations. The area has been fenced off and a headstone laid to memorialise the victims. Source: Supplied / Graham Blewitt Setting up the war crimes tribunal Blewitt was still working for the SIU when Yugoslavia started to collapse in the early 1990s. The former socialist bloc included the republics of Croatia, Slovenia, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia (now Republic of North Macedonia), Montenegro, and the autonomous regions of Kosovo and Vojvodina. When some declared independence, a series of violent ethnic conflicts broke out. "There were daily news reports on the radio, on the TV, in newspapers and it was fairly obvious that there were war crimes being committed," Blewitt says. In 1992, the United Nations Security Council voted to establish a tribunal, the ICTY, to investigate. Blewitt took on the role of deputy prosecutor in February 1994. He arrived in The Hague to find himself entirely in charge of building the office from scratch, recruiting staff and commencing investigations Its first prosecutor, Richard Goldstone, was appointed in August after being released from the constitutional court in South Africa by Nelson Mandela. A sketch now hanging in Graham Blewitt's home office captures the intensity of his early days at the ICTY, establishing the prosecutor's office, recruiting staff, and launching investigations. Source: SBS News / Alexandra Jones Prosecuting a genocide In July 1995, Blewitt's desk was already piled high with reports of atrocities throughout the Balkans: mass killings of unarmed civilians, widespread detentions in concentration camps, torture, and rape. But he remembers hearing reports "something terrible" had happened in Srebrenica, a small town in the far east of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It would turn out to be the largest mass killing on European soil since World War Two, and was later determined to be a genocide by the ICTY and the International Court of Justice. More than 8,000 mostly Muslim men and boys were slaughtered in what had been designated a United Nations 'safe zone'. Blewitt says his team "established very early in the piece" that the attack on Srebrenica was carried out by Bosnian Serb forces under the military command of General Ratko Mladić, and leadership of Radovan Karadžić. They set out to indict both. General Ratko Mladic (left) with Republika Srpska leader Radovan Karadzic (right) in Pale, Bosnia and Herzegovina on 5 August 1993, two years before the attack on Srebrenica that would later be determined to be a genocide. Source: AAP / Stringer/EPA The investigation soon revealed the existence of mass graves, containing the bodies of thousands of victims who had been executed. "We were assisted greatly by the Americans who gave us aerial imagery of the mass grave sites," Blewitt says. "Once the Serbs found out we were aware of the grave sites, they started to remove the bodies and took them to more remote locations to bury them in secondary graves. We were able to identify both the primary grave sites and the secondary sites, and we decided to carry out exhumations of the bodies in those grave sites." Blewitt says his work ordering exhumations during the Nazi war crimes investigations in Australia was a "major help", as some of the staff involved were now working with him in The Hague. "Painstakingly, they examined the sites by comparing soil samples," he says. "They were able to link the secondary sites with the primary sites, and all that forensic evidence became very important in the subsequent prosecutions that took place." ICTY investigators clearing soil and debris from a mass grave containing the bodies of Srebrenica victims near the village of Pilica, on 18 September 1996. Source: AAP / AP In November 1995, indictments were issued against Karadžić and Mladić, preventing them from attending peace talks in Dayton, Ohio. Critics told them the decision might interrupt the peace process. "But our view was that you can't have peace without justice and that they were the primary persons responsible for the genocide, so they had to be prosecuted," Blewitt says. Graham Blewitt setting up the ICTY's prosecutor's office in The Hague in 1994. Many of the staff he recruited were Australians who had worked with him on the SIU's Nazi cases. Source: Supplied How to arrest an alleged war criminal Blewitt recalls the prosecutor's office reaching a point where dozens of public indictments had been issued, but the ICTY was at risk of becoming a "toothless tiger" because none of the people accused of war crimes had been brought to trial. There was finally a breakthrough in 1996 during the term of the ICTY's second chief prosecutor, Louise Arbour from Canada. "We were able to effectively force NATO, the [Stabilisation Force in Bosnia and Herzegovina] SFOR, into starting to arrest the fugitives," Blewitt says. "Once the first arrest attempt took place, it opened up the floodgates." Before we knew it, the detention centre in The Hague was full and it was necessary to build two additional courtrooms to accommodate all the accused. It was an exciting and historic moment, which Blewitt says shaped the face of The Hague and international humanitarian law forever. "Trials were taking place on a daily basis in three courtrooms, the tribunal was well and truly underway," he says. "[It] gave confidence to those setting up the permanent international court — the ICC — and when that was established, then clearly the legacy of the tribunal had made itself clear." Graham Blewitt (front right) and Richard Goldstone (front left) with the ICTY's 11 judges at The Hague in 1994. Source: Supplied Alleged war criminal drinks poison in courtroom The war crimes trials continued long after Blewitt finished his post as ICTY's deputy prosecutor. It was a chapter that dominated the headlines. Then Serbian president Slobodan Milošević was the first sitting head of state to be indicted for war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide. But he was found dead in his cell in The Hague while on trial in 2006. A post-mortem determined he died of a heart attack. The indictment of Slobodan Milošević, the then Serbian president, in 1999. (Left to right) Graham Blewitt holding up the indictment, chief prosecutor Louise Arbour signing the indictment, and the pair preparing to hand the indictment to ICTY Judge David Hunt, from Australia. Source: Supplied In 2017, Bosnian-Croat general Slobodan Praljak died after drinking poison in the courtroom. When the judge dismissed an appeal to overturn his war crimes conviction, Praljak declared "Slobodan Praljak is not a war criminal" before drinking from a small bottle in full view of court cameras. Former Croatian Serb leader Milan Babic also took his own life in a UN detention centre in 2006. Another Croatian Serb, Slavko Dokmanovic, did the same in 1998. Karadžić and Mladić were found guilty of war crimes and genocide in 2016 and 2017, respectively. Both received life sentences and remain in prison in The Hague. "All 161 individuals indicted by the tribunal were dealt with; either arrested, stood trial, some were convicted, some were acquitted, some died," Blewitt says. When he left the ICTY in 2004, Blewitt felt "very optimistic that at last international criminal law was enforceable". "But at this point in time, I don't hold that optimism anymore," he says. Frustration as world leaders undermine prosecutions With wars raging around the world, Blewitt has been watching in frustration as some world leaders undermine the institutions set up to hold the perpetrators of war crimes to account. In February, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order sanctioning the ICC, saying the court had issued "baseless warrants" against Israeli leaders, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. It noted the ICC — which relies on the cooperation of its 125 member states to carry out any arrest warrants — had no jurisdiction over either Israel or the US, as neither are parties to the Rome Statute, the treaty which created the court. The ICC's 'Situation in the State of Palestine' case says it has reasonable grounds to believe Netanyahu and his former defence minister Yoav Gallant bear criminal responsibility for "the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare; and the crimes against humanity of murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts". Israel denies the allegations. Technically, any member of the ICC is required to arrest Netanyahu if he travels there, although the court has no independent power to enforce warrants. In April, Hungary announced it would withdraw from the ICC before hosting Netanyahu. Trump's order personally sanctioned the ICC's prosecutor, Karim Khan. The US later imposed sanctions on a further four ICC judges in June, which barred their entry to the US and blocked any property or other interests in the country. The ICC has condemned Trump's executive order, which it said sought to "harm its independent and impartial judicial work". Blewitt views Trump's sanctions on the ICC as "an appalling situation" that potentially interferes with the course of justice, and believes many international leaders could be in contempt of court. Alongside its investigation into Israel, the ICC has also been investigating war crimes and crimes against humanity alleged to have been carried out during the US invasion and occupation of Afghanistan between 2001 and 2021. The ICC is currently handling 33 cases, has issued 61 arrest warrants, detained 22 people and issued 11 convictions. Source: AP / Omar Havana Israel accused of war crimes Gallant described the ICC's push for warrants against him and Netanyahu as an attempt to deny the state of Israel the right to defend itself and ensure the release of hostages. "The parallel [Karim Khan] has drawn between the Hamas terrorist organisation and the State of Israel is despicable," he said in May. The ICC issued an arrest warrant for Hamas leader Mohammed Deif for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes, but the charges were dropped in February after his death. Netanyahu has repeatedly called the allegations against him "absurd and false". The ICC's investigation into actions within the Palestinian territories began in 2021, and it has been looking at events going back to 2014. It now includes actions related to the Hamas attack of October 7 2023. Blewitt points to reports, including in The Guardian, that Israel's intelligence service, Mossad, had allegedly surveilled, hacked, pressured and threatened senior ICC staff in an effort to derail the court's inquiries. He claims a former colleague involved in the Netanyahu and Gallant indictments had resigned from the ICC due to stress after being advised by police to take security precautions, such as getting a bulletproof front door and windows installed at their home. It's one thing not to recognise the tribunal, the ICC, but it's another thing to deliberately interfere with the processes. The Israeli government did not respond to SBS News' request for comment. The Israeli Prime Minister's office has previously called the allegations about Mossad "false and unfounded". Graham Blewitt was instrumental in setting up the ICTY, which became the blueprint for the International Criminal Court. He has closely followed how its legacy is influencing the ICC's approach to war crimes allegations in conflicts like Ukraine and Gaza. Source: SBS News / Alexandra Jones Claims of genocide The ICC case has not included the charge of genocide. Blewitt says, if he were in the ICC prosecutor's office today, he would have "no hesitation in bringing an indictment against the Israeli leaders for genocide, and let the court decide whether it's genocide or not". He compares it to Srebrenica, which was at the time deemed a "clear-cut genocide", because there was a "genocidal intent" to "destroy in whole or in part a political, ethnic, or religious group". Asked why he has this assessment, Blewitt says: "There's no direct evidence apart from comments made by various Israeli leaders from time to time suggesting that they just want to wipe the Palestinians from the face of the Earth." He says there appears to be a lack of proportionality to the Israeli strikes, which often kill children or innocent civilians. "They'll bomb a building and say they're after a particular Hamas leader and not worry about the 30, 40, 50, 100 people in close proximity who are killed or injured as a result of that strike," Blewitt says. Israel has repeatedly denied targeting civilians and has accused Hamas of using civilians as "human shields". This week, Israeli government spokesperson David Mencer again rejected genocide accusations. "It is baseless. There is no intent, key for the charge of genocide," Mencer said. Israel has repeatedly denied targeting civilians and has accused Hamas of using civilians as "human shields". Source: AP / Mohammad Abu Samra How alleged Gaza war crimes could be investigated Blewitt says the process of investigating alleged war crimes in Gaza would be very different from his experience in the 1990s, when there was no social media or iPhones. Now anyone with a phone can record what's happening and there's no end of evidence for those investigating what's happening in Gaza. "The difference now is that it's not possible for investigators to gain entry to Gaza on the ground or to investigate crime scenes," Blewitt says. "In 1995, ICTY investigators had access to crime scenes. But right now, those investigating Gaza do not." The Gaza health ministry says nearly 60,000 people have been killed in Gaza since October 7 2023. It does not distinguish between civilians and combatants. Blewitt, as a former prosecutor, says if he were in charge now, it would be hard to know where to start, but he would likely begin by looking at the most serious incidents. He explains the ICC can only bring indictments against Israel's leaders if it can establish that Israel hasn't fully investigated the alleged crimes and held those responsible to account. No peace without justice The ICTY's war crimes cases took over a decade to resolve, and the resolution of cases related to current conflicts, such as those in Gaza and Ukraine, could face the same delays. Blewitt says outcomes may depend on whether the ICC can regain its legitimacy in the face of efforts to undermine it. "If the ICC can outlast the Trump administration and can regain some credibility, then maybe it'll be back on track," he says. Graham Blewitt in The Hague outside the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia at the end of his tenure as deputy prosecutor in 2004. Source: Supplied / Vincent Mentzel 2004 In recent weeks, international condemnation over Israel's actions in Gaza has grown, particularly in relation to humanitarian aid and the growing hunger crisis. World leaders, including Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, have rejected Israel's denials that there is "no starvation in Gaza". Even Trump says images of children are "real starvation stuff". Human rights groups in Israel are also accusing the government of genocide, including prominent activist Yuli Novak of B'Tselem. While there are undeniable forces working against international criminal justice, Blewitt considers the opportunity to work in the field a "privilege". "You can't have peace without justice." — Additional reporting by AFP If you or someone you know is impacted by sexual assault, call 1800RESPECT on 1800 737 732, text 0458 737 732, or visit . In an emergency, call 000. Readers seeking crisis support can ring Lifeline on 13 11 14 or text 0477 13 11 14, the Suicide Call Back Service on 1300 659 467 and Kids Helpline on 1800 55 1800 (for young people aged up to 25). More information and support with mental health is available at and on 1300 22 4636.
SBS Australia
an hour ago
- SBS Australia
From fleeing war to getting engaged in 10 days: Meet five of parliament's newest faces
Australia's federal parliament has welcomed almost 40 new parliamentarians, among whom are ex mortuary workers, former diplomats and those who have fled war. The May election brought to Canberra greater numbers of women — with 112 women across the two houses now just slightly trailing men at 114 — and people from diverse cultural backgrounds. There are now eight First Nations politicians, an increase of two from the last parliament. As the dust settled on the first sitting fortnight, SBS News spoke to five new senators and MPs. Here's what we found out. Senator for SA Charlotte Walker Australia's youngest senator, Charlotte Walker, thinks her perspective makes her particularly qualified for the job, after an unlikely win in the third spot on Labor's ticket in South Australia. The 21-year-old has gone from uploading make-up tutorials to sitting in parliament and chatting policy while playing Minecraft to reach electorally important younger voters. "Obviously, I am younger than my colleagues, it's no secret, but I've still got my own experiences, and I think that my experience shouldn't be devalued just because of my age," she told SBS News. That experience includes growing up in the country town of Yankallila, where she witnessed a domestic violence crisis and recalled seeing children miss class in primary school due to fights going on at home or parents fleeing abusive relationships. Charlotte Walker is Australia's youngest senator. Source: SBS News / Rania Yallop Walker says that, outside of government funding for services, there needs to be an shift in attitudes to domestic and family violence and encourages Australians to call out unacceptable behaviour by friends or family. "It might have just been a friendly joke, and there wasn't any bad intention there, but we really need to be calling people out when we see things like this. That's where it starts," she said. Promising to advocate for the interests of fellow young Australians, she said: "we hear you and we will act on your demands for a better future." LISTEN TO Last week, Walker cited young people's fears of finding a rental property or being able to afford moving out of their childhood homes and said climate change wasn't "a matter of faith or belief" for young people but "hard fact". Senator for NSW Jess Collins Liberal senator Jess Collins insists her election victory shows that suggestions women in the Coalition face a glass cliff or are put in unwinnable seats "is a total myth". She highlights the number of "amazing female candidates", arguing the NSW branch would have been "close to gender parity" if the party had done better at the election. In a first speech that drew several laughs, Collins revealed she got engaged to now-husband Ben only 10 days after their first date — although she did note they had been friends for decades beforehand. Liberal senator Jess Collins says there is no "glass ceiling" for women in the party. Source: SBS News / James Smillie After having four children in as many years, her time as a stay-at-home mum has informed her passion for recognising the "contribution of the family", including changes to the tax system. She said we need to "flip the script" on childcare subsidies, suggesting that — instead of pumping billions into the subsidy system — the government should make fees for child care while a parent is at work tax deductible. "When you lodge a tax return at the end of the year, you can apply all of your childcare fees against the money that you earned, and that'll effectively bring down the tax that you pay," she told SBS News. With a PhD in anthropology and fond memories of her research visits to Papua New Guinea, Collins would like to see development aid programs trickle down more effectively to people on the ground. She emphasised the importance of links from "community to community, rather than government to government". The New Zealand-born senator is close to fulfilling another dream. Collins hopes to acquire her first set of footy boots soon, enthusiastically telling SBS she played touch footy for the second time in her life with colleagues on a dewy Canberra morning during the first sitting week. Banks MP Zhi Soon Zhi Soon still finds it "a bit surreal" to sit in the chamber as the MP for the Sydney seat of Banks, having won the seat — held by the Liberals since 2013 — on his second go. The Malaysian-born former diplomat, previously stationed in Afghanistan, is inspired to apply lessons learned from other countries and make Australia "an education superpower". Currently looking at early childhood options for eight-month-old daughter Dorothy, he is passionate about "making sure that every child in this country can access mobile childhood education right through to schooling from primary school to secondary school". Banks MP Zhi Soon is passionate about education access. Source: SBS News / Rania Yallop He says Australia can learn from the likes of South Korea, Singapore and Finland. While Soon was elected to a suburban Sydney electorate, he's no stranger to getting his hands dirty, with his in-laws often putting him to work on the farm. "A bit of everything, from feeding potty lambs to chipping burrs [removing weeds], mending fences and helping out with drenching [giving sheep medication to prevent parasites], is pretty commonplace when I go out there," he said. In his first speech, Soon said multiculturalism is more than a word. Elaborating to SBS News, he recalled different families that have treated his "with such warmth". "It's about bringing people together, no matter what background you come from and being able to share that culture with each other". This included food, and he said he grew up on Lebanese kibbeh. Calwell MP Basem Abdo New father Basem Abdo brought home his son Noah on election day, 3 May, a joy compounded by keeping the Victorian seat of Calwell in Labor's hands after a tight race that involved 13 candidates. While his focus is steadfast on his community, he finds being separated from the four-month-old tough, but says he has unlocked a new skill: "sleeping standing up". In an emotional first speech, Abdo shared several trials, from leaving Kuwait in 1990 at the outbreak of the First Gulf War to more recently, losing his mother. Basem Adbo has experienced the effects of war first-hand. Source: SBS News / Rania Yallop His memories of buildings shaking and taping windows, as well as being "confronted by Israeli occupation" during a 2011 visit to the the occupied West Bank , inform his advice to colleagues about war. "When we turn off our television screens, those things are still happening. And it's incumbent on all of us to consider that and to consider the long-term view of things when we're trying to reshape things," he told SBS News. Abdo says he will champion issues of his community inside the private caucus process, including Palestinian statehood, which he views as more than symbolic. "It's the right of self-determination. I would view it as a right, not as just symbolism," he said. The first MP of Palestinian heritage represents a diverse electorate, with one in four residents Muslim. He looks forward to tackling economic challenges important to his community, including aligning "skills policy with the jobs of the future". "It's not just for young people coming out of high school, it's also people in middle age [who are] going to reskill. As we transition the economy, we don't want a generation gap," he said. Barton MP Ash Ambihaipaher The young lawyer, who won the safe Labor seat of Barton in Sydney, is proud to have been raised by a diverse community from her Tamil Sri Lankan uncle, Thiru, to an Italian family that taught her to "brine olives, make salami and roast chestnuts". She used her inaugural speech to recognise how much Barton has changed, highlighting that Australia's first prime minister Edmund Barton, for whom the seat is named, championed the White Australia policy, while over half of the seat's residents are now born overseas. "I think pointing it out was just to illustrate that we as a community, nationally, Australia has evolved, and that's okay, and it's about learning from the past," she told SBS News. The seat was previously held by former minister for Indigenous Australians Linda Burney, who retired from parliament at the election. Ambihaipaher describes being "personally devastated" by the failure of the Voice to Parliament referendum. However, she thinks a lack of information and understanding within her community highlights an opportunity to bridge an education gap about "what we're trying to achieve". Ash Ambihaipaher says she "lives and breathes multiculturalism". Source: SBS News / Rania Yallop "If we don't fill that gap with education and truth-telling and talking about what has happened, then we've lost. We're already on the back foot in that sense," she said. Adding later, "I think we end up living in little silos, and I think it's important that any representative should be a conduit to make sure that people understand each other's issues." Chatting to SBS amid the chaos of the first parliamentary fortnight, Ambihaipaher recalls "finding peace" and moments of reflection in a previous job, working in a mortuary. "When there's a lot going on in in this world you do reflect on those times when you're in the mortuary, it's very quiet. You've just got this little crackling radio in the background. It is a very peaceful place," she said.
Sky News AU
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'It's Covid all over again': Labor bending at the knee to eSafety Commissioner's advice on YouTube ban while turning blind eye to our freedom, education
There is nothing in politics more ominous than a government that wants to be seen to be 'doing something'. A government that feels something must be done on a controversial topic is likely to act so boldly and so quickly that they don't have time to consider the consequences, and those who suffer are left to pick up the pieces. The popular thing to do these days is find an expert on an issue and outsource all responsibility on policy to them. Trusting an expert sounds nice - they know a lot and often have a reassuring 'Dr' at the start of their name. It's never the case that this expert is democratically elected or answerable to the people that their decisions affect. They are there for the government to hide behind - don't look at us, we had to do whatever the expert told us to. This was all the rage during Covid. Various state governments' preferred experts would recommend all sorts of bizarre restrictions - shutting South Australia down over a pizza box, for instance - but the government could tell their voters they were taking the issue seriously, because they were listening to the experts. I thought after Australians were told not to touch a football if it came into the stands of the Adelaide Oval that Australians were done stomaching the idea that we should listen solely to the experts. But Labor's talking points over the social media ban - especially its backflip on an exemption for YouTube - is a test for my theory. Social media use in teenagers is an area the government really wants to be seen as 'doing something'. It's a hot topic and for good reason. Mental health in teenagers, particularly among girls, has nosedived since smartphones and social media became widespread. Parents feel helpless. They know that social media will hurt their child, but also know depriving them of social media when all of their friends have them harms them as well. The government has jumped on this and come up with their social media ban. They also found their expert and outsourced responsibility to her. Enter the eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant. The level of deferral from the government to this public servant is galling. In Question Time on Wednesday, Minister Anika Wells referenced the commissioner four times in her one answer about the social media ban - including saying she 'was required by the law to seek advice from the eSafety Commissioner on the draft rules, and the eSafety Commissioner's advice was clear'. That's all well and good - but the Australian people did not elect the eSafety commissioner. They elected Anika Wells, and they elected her to do far more than ask Julie Inman Grant what to do then listen politely. The eSafety Commssioner's duty according to the government is to ensure Australians 'have safer, more positive online experiences.' But that is just one piece of the puzzle when it comes to forming policy about the online world. Safety must be balanced with freedom, educational possibilities, economic concerns and a whole raft of other factors. We'd all be free of harm from social media if we never went on the internet again - but we'd also lose all of the wonderful benefits it gives us too. It's Covid all over again. Then governments outsourced responsibility to Chief Health Officers whose primary concern was safety and stopping the spread of the virus - because that was their area of expertise. Other concerns like students' education, mental wellbeing, individual freedom and the economy - issues that should have been considered with the same seriousness as the virus itself - were swept aside in the narrow view of stopping the spread. And now other factors are being swept aside in the narrow view the government and the eSafety Commissioner are taking when it comes to social media, and particularly YouTube. The government this week reversed its commitment to exempt YouTube from their social media ban for people under the age of 16. The problem with that is that YouTube does not behave in the same way as Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook or the other social media networking sites. Those latter sites rely on users sharing information with each other, such as photos and updates. Teenagers spend hours cultivating their profiles to make their lives look idyllic, and spend further hours seeing the photos and lifestyles of people they know look even more idyllic - a vicious cycle that harms mental health. YouTube does not act like that. There is not as much person-to-person sharing as there are in the other social media networks. People watch videos and move on to other videos. In fact a survey released by the eSafety Commission itself found that YouTube is one of the safest social media websites for teenagers in terms of the risk of grooming, sexual harassment and bullying. Teenagers are more likely to be targeted over text message than over YouTube. The 'safety' concerns around YouTube are less about bullying and comparative lifestyles and more about what content is popular on YouTube, such as conservative opinions. Julie Inman Grant told the National Press Club this year that she was concerned YouTube's 'opaque algorithms' were 'driving users down rabbit holes they're powerless to fight against'. That's a whole different reason for enforcing safety and completely removed from the original conversation around protecting children online. But it's not unexpected considering the eSafety Commissioner's remit is to ensure online safety. It's up to the government to balance the desire for safety with other effects a ban on YouTube would have - especially education. Oxford Economics this year found that 72 per cent of parents agree that YouTube helps their children learn and 79 per cent of parents agree YouTube provides quality content for their children's learning. In an interview on Sky News this week, YouTube personality Leo Pugilsi said his teachers upload videos of themselves explaining what was discussed in school to help children out with homework. This is what the government is impacting when it listens solely to the eSafety Commissioner. An unforgivable sin from Covid was our governments letting experts tell them the education of children was a secondary concern. By listening solely to the eSafety Commissioner and ignoring the educational benefits of YouTube, Labor is making the same mistake again - all in the name of "doing something". James Bolt is a Sky News Australia contributor.
