Australia plans tougher national terror laws

This article is more than 12 months old

Oct 05, 2017 06:00 am

SYDNEY: Australia unveiled plans yesterday to hold terror suspects for 14 days without charge and beef up its database to include biometric data from driving licences.

New South Wales already permits detention for 14 days but other states and territories allow only a week or less, and the federal government wants to standardise the law.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull is also pushing for driving licence photos to be added to a database that already includes passport pictures and immigration data, so police can identify suspected terrorists quicker.

In addition, he wants to make it an offence to possess "instructional" material that could be used to carry out attacks. - AFP