When is a Journalist a Terrorist?

Q: When is a journalist a potential terrorist? A: When s/he’s interviewed Osama Bin Laden - according to the Australian Federal Government.

Prominent UK editor and outspoken critic of the Iraq War, Abdel Bari-Atwan, has finally been granted a visa in an about-face by Australian immigration officials. But only after taking his case against the government to the Australian media.

The editor of Al-Quds Al-Arabi newspaper, who has been invited to speak at the Brisbane Writers Festival this weekend, was intially refused a visa without explanation. Dr Bari-Atwan told the ABC's AM program he believed he was a victim of direct racism. “If I am going to be banned, simply because my name is Abdel Bari Atwan and because I am Muslim and because…I don't have white skin, because I don't have blue eyes... It is racial discrimination.”

Within two days of the interview being aired, he was granted that elusive visa and he's now making his way to Australia. For its part, a spokesperson for the Department of Immigration says the visa application was never denied… it was just delayed. Maybe it went missing in the same place they lost Vivien Solon and Cornelia Rau? Or perhaps, like Dr Haneef, he was just deemed, without evidence, to be of ‘bad character’.

Dr Bari-Atwan was the last Western journalist to interview Osama Bin Laden and he’s a regular guest on CNN, the BBC and Al Jazera. But as he pointed out on AM, interviewing a terrorist and taking a contrary stand to the Iraq War don’t make him a terrorist. “I don't have a criminal record. I have never been indulged in any sort of Islamic fundamentalism. I am a secular person so why they are treating me like this?” He asked.

He’s also been a frequent visitor to the US, where he’s been granted visas to deliver lectures at bastions of extremism such as Harvard University. That makes us more security-conscious than the justifiably paranoid US of A.

Banning journalists and political opponents; discriminating against visitors on the basis of their religion and skin colour…what’s next? Detention without charge? Suppression of free speech? Restrictions on freedom of movement and association? Our government using fear as a political tool? Oh yeah, we're already there.