Australia's last remaining Islamic State-linked woman held in a Syrian detention camp has been granted authorisation to return home, after the government determined it no longer had the legal power to block her. Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke confirmed that Hodan Abby, a former Sydney resident, will be permitted to re-enter the country under strict surveillance conditions, bringing to a close a years-long saga involving a cohort of Australian women and children who followed husbands and fathers to join IS in the Middle East.

Abby had been the only member of the group subject to a temporary exclusion order — a counterterrorism measure that allows the government to prevent a citizen suspected of terrorist sympathies from returning for up to two years. Originally issued on the advice of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), the order required Abby to apply for a special permit to return, functioning as a temporary single-use passport. Burke said the government received final legal advice that it could no longer attach an exclusion condition to that permit. "When a permit is requested, a permit lawfully has to be issued," he told ABC Radio. International and domestic law both establish that a government must facilitate a citizen's return to their home country, leaving little room for continued refusal once the exclusion period runs its course.

Upon arrival, Abby will face what Burke described as an unprecedented level of monitoring. She must give 24 hours' notice before using any communications device, including a mobile phone or public payphone, and will be tracked at home, at work or study, and in the broader community. ASIO Director-General Mike Burgess offered assurances that his agency is prepared. "Anyone who is considered a high or medium risk gets my agency's full attention," he said. Abby was previously blocked from boarding a flight from Damascus in May, but the government has not specified when she will now travel.

The women and children in the broader group spent more than a decade in the region — first under IS rule, then in squalid camps after the collapse of the self-declared caliphate in 2019. Some of the children were born in those camps. Earlier this year, four IS-linked families were allowed to return, and several women have since faced criminal charges including slave-related offences and crimes against humanity. Around 60 Australians were detained across the camps at various points; all have now returned.

The decision is likely to generate political controversy. Coalition frontbencher James Paterson accused the Labor government of failing to use every available tool to keep the group offshore, saying it had not had "its heart in protecting Australia." Security analysts and legal experts, however, argue the outcome is both the only lawful course and arguably the safest one. ASIO has previously noted that monitoring potential threats is far more effective on home soil than in unstable foreign camps. Experts also warn that leaving Australians stranded in Syrian camps — exposed to IS-aligned individuals and with powerful personal stories of exclusion — creates tangible propaganda risks that could be exploited for online recruitment, whether by choice or coercion.