I wonder who's been naughty among our former politicians?
which party would try to inveigle a former PM to meet with a foreign spy?
I'm sure most here would guess Rudd and I wouldn't argue against such a possibility but I wouldn't rule out any former PM - not even Howard as a target for espionage.
An unnamed former Australian politician, who was successfully cultivated by an international spy ring, once suggested bringing a prime minister's family member into contact with his foreign handlers.
The boss of Australia's domestic intelligence organisation has given few details of the alleged plot from "several years ago" but has confirmed the Counter Foreign Interference Taskforce has conducted more than 120 operations since it was established in 2020.
Delivering his annual threat assessment, the director general of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) has revealed he regularly speaks to overseas counterparts to urge them to stop espionage activities here, adding "and they usually do".
and.......
Since the Hamas attack on Israel in October last year, ASIO says it seen "heightened community tensions that have translated into some incidents of violence" connected to protests, but believes Australians are not travelling to terrorist groups in the Middle East.
"While the conflict is a long way away from Australia, it is resonating here and ASIO is carefully monitoring the implications for domestic security," Mr Burgess said.
"Sunni violent extremism poses the greatest religiously motivated violent extremist threat in Australia. But we are not seeing Australians travelling to join the terrorists in the Middle East as we did for the ISIL Caliphate.
"And thankfully, we have not seen the lone actor attacks that have occurred elsewhere and were inspired by that conflict," Mr Burgess noted.
"Over the last 18 months, we've also seen an uptick in the number of nationalist and racist violent extremists advocating sabotage in private conversations, both here and overseas.
"It's particularly pronounced among 'accelerationists' – extremists who want to trigger a so-called 'race war'," the ASIO boss added.
ABC LINK.
