MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Australia’s Parliament on Tuesday passed new gun restrictions and began debating proposed hate speech laws after two gunmen killed 15 people at a Jewish festival in Sydney last month in an attack authorities say was inspired by the Islamic State group.
The gun laws create new restrictions on gun ownership and create a government-funded buyback program to compensate people forced to surrender their firearms.
Laws against hate speech allow hate groups that do not fit Australia’s definition of a terrorist organisation, such as the Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir, to be banned. Hizb ut-Tahrir is already illegal by some countries.
The government had initially planned a single bill, but separated the issues into two bills introduced in the Chamber of Deputies on Tuesday.
Both bills passed the House, and the firearms bill passed the Senate late Tuesday. The bill against hate speech is expected to pass into law by Wednesday.
Earlier on Tuesday, Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke told Parliament that alleged gunmen Sajid Akram, 50, and his son Naveed Akram, 24, would not be allowed to own firearms under the proposed laws.
The father, who was shot dead by police during the attack on Jewish worshipers during Hanukkah celebrations at Bondi Beach on December 14, legally owned the weapons used.
His son, who was wounded, was charged with dozens of crimes, including 15 counts of murder and one of committing a terrorist act because of the attack.
Burke said the Indian-born father would be barred from owning guns under the proposed laws because he was not an Australian citizen.
The Australian-born son would also be banned, having come under surveillance by the Australian Security Intelligence Agency, or ASIO, a spy agency in 2019 due to his association with suspected extremists.
“In responding to the antisemitic terror attack, we have to deal with the motivation and we have to deal with the method,” Burke told Parliament.
“We’re dealing with two people there who had horrible anti-Semitic bigotry in their minds and hearts. And they had weapons they didn’t have,” Burke added.
ASIO will also have a role under the proposed hate speech laws to decide which hate groups should be outlawed. Neo-Nazi group the National Socialist Network has announced plans to disband rather than target its members under the laws.
Parliament was scheduled to resume for the year in February, but was brought back early to respond to Australia’s worst mass shooting since 1996.
A lone shooter killed 35 people in the state of Tasmania that year, in a massacre that prompted the nation to introduce tough gun laws that sharply reduced the number of rapid-fire firearms in public ownership. The government then bought back nearly 700,000 guns.
But the states of Tasmania and Queensland and the Northern Territory are resisting the federal push for new weapons purchases, for which the states would be expected to pay half the cost.
Burke said his government would continue to negotiate with states and territories on buybacks.