Australia stops 2 teens at airport from joining ISIL

Australian authorities have stopped two teenage brothers at Sydney Airport on suspicion that they were travelling to the Middle East to join the ranks of the ISIL terror group.

Australia’s Minister for Immigration and Border Protection Peter Dutton says the pair, aged 16 and 17, were arrested as they attempted to leave the county on Friday afternoon.

They were stopped after objects in their luggage raised suspicion of customs officials who in turn reported the brothers to the airport’s new counter-terrorism unit.

“These two young men aged 16 and 17 are kids, not killers, and they shouldn’t be allowed to go to a foreign land to fight then come back to our land eventually more radicalized,” he told reporters.

The minister refused to identify the exact destination of the teens and only referred to a “conflict zone” in the Middle East. Australia’s media reports, however, said the pair intended to travel to Turkey without the knowledge of their parents.

The boys’ parents are “shocked” by the teenagers’ move to depart Australia, Dutton said, adding that they had been affected by Takfiri groups’ online propaganda.

“ISIL is a cancer — not just in the Middle East but across the board,” he said.

Charges would be filed against the two boys whose names have not been published as they are juvenile suspects.

Based on new laws, any Australian who travels to ISIL-controlled territories without a legitimate reason could be punished with up to 10 years in jail.

“These were two misguided young Australians, Australian born and bred…and yet it seems they had succumbed to the lure of the death cult,” Prime Minister Tony Abbott said in reaction to the incident, adding that the boys “were on the verge of doing something terrible and dangerous.”

Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop recently said that passports of those who attempt to go to prescribed areas in the conflict zone could be confiscated.

Canberra said last month that nearly 100 Australians have been fighting alongside and backing terrorist groups in Iraq and Syria and have had their passports cancelled.