Australian government wrongly cancelled citizenship of man on death row in Iraq, family claim

The former Coalition government wrongly cancelled the citizenship of an Australian man on death row in Iraq, leaving him stateless as he awaited hanging on terrorism charges, his family and lawyers claim.

Ahmad Merhi, originally from Sydney, travelled to Syria in 2014. He was captured in the country in 2017.

Merhi, 30, was then transferred by US forces to Iraq, one of a series of prisoner transfers that has concerned human rights groups.

In Iraq, Merhi says he was coerced into confessing to terrorism charges and in November 2018 he was sentenced to death by hanging.

Merhi says he was informed by letter after his sentencing that his citizenship had been cancelled. He is eligible for Lebanese citizenship, but says he has never held it.

The Department of Home Affairs did not answer the questions, instead saying it did not comment on individual cases but was considering the implications of the recent high court judgment.

He will consider a court challenge to the decision depending on the response.

Although the recent high court judgment referred only to those who had citizenship cancelled under section 36B of the act, a section under which only two citizenships had been cancelled, Khan believes it provides grounds for challenges against all cancellations.

Aside from his alleged involvement with Islamic State in Syria, sentencing remarks relating to the case of an alleged associate show Merhi is suspected by police of assisting Shadi Mohammad, the sister of a man who killed Curtis Cheng in 2015, to flee to Syria, and of arranging for Islamic State supporters in Australia to transfer money to the Middle East.

He has previously been referred to as Ahmed Merhi in some media reports and court documents.

A family member, who did not wish to be named, said that regardless of what Merhi was accused of he should face justice in Australia.

He has had little contact with Australian officials, other than being informed about his citizenship cancellation, and being told he had been denied legal aid funding.

In more than three years since he was sentenced to death, Merhi has only been able to speak to his family on a handful of occasions, they say.

Merhi lost part of a leg in an airstrike, and in the short phone conversations he has with his mother about every three months, he mostly tells her about his health, asks if she has heard anything from authorities, and tells her he loves her.

In the weeks between calls, the family worries that they will hear on the news that Merhi has been executed, a torment that has been particularly hard on his mother.

It has been eight years since he left home, after, his family say, winning a raffle prize at a local mosque to travel to hajj.

They were somewhat shocked that the labourer, who enjoyed girlfriends, parties and trips to the beach, planned on making the pilgrimage.

The leader of the opposition, Peter Dutton, who was the home affairs minister when Merhi says his citizenship was cancelled, was on leave. His office did not respond to a request for comment.