Criticism of the Fraser authorities for bringing in “Lebanese-Muslim” refugees
November 2016
On November 18, 2016, Dutton stated: “The truth is Malcolm Fraser did make errors in bringing some folks in, within the Seventies, and we’re seeing that as we speak.”1
On November 21, pressed to establish which “folks” he was referring to, Dutton stated, “The recommendation I’ve is that out of the final 33 individuals who have been charged with terrorist-related offences on this nation, 22 of these individuals are from second- and third-generation Lebanese-Muslim background.”2
In August 2023, Dutton referred to these feedback as “feedback that I shouldn’t have made … I’ve apologised for that. However once more, whenever you’re within the thrust of it and within the thick of it, we had been coping with individuals who had been radicalised and plenty of of them shared a background and that’s type of the factual actuality of what we had been coping with.”3
Twelve months later, Lebanese-Australian group leaders stated they had been unaware of any apology from Dutton.4
