A court in far north Australia ordered Monday that five men charged for alleged plans to leave the country by boat to eventually join Daesh in Syria be extradited to Melbourne to face trial.
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Over the weekend the men were charged with making preparations for incursions into foreign countries to engage in hostile activities.
About 100 people have left Australia for Syria to fight alongside organisations such as IS, said Australia’s Immigration Minister last month.
“The Victorian Joint Counter Terrorism Team are now executing a number of warrants in the northern and north-western suburbs of Melbourne as a part of Operation Middleham”, a Victoria state police spokeswoman said.
But they had also signalled that if charges were to be laid, they were likely be under “foreign incursion” laws which prohibit travelling to another country with the intention of engaging in hostilities.
Brandis said they were arrested at an unspecified location north of Cairns, a gateway to the Great Barrier Reef popular with worldwide tourists.
The men, who were arrested earlier this week, bought a 7m boat and drove it 2,840km from Melbourne north to Queensland state where they planned to set sail to Indonesia, the Australian Federal Police said.
The group was reportedly detained after towing a 23-feet vessel from Australian southeastern city of Melbourne to northeastern Cape York, over 1,800 miles.
A separate police statement said there was no current threat of a terrorist act to the Australian community arising from this investigation.
The maximum penalty is life imprisonment.
He added: “There are a number of people in Australia under surveillance, and in the event that they were to attempt a terrorist crime, or to attempt to leave Australia in order to perpetrate terrorist war fighting overseas, then they would be taken into custody”.
Cerantonio and co-accused Shayden Thorne, Kadir Kaya, Antonio Grenata and Paul Dacre have not entered pleas.
Police say they planned to travel by boat through Indonesia to the Philippines.
The government has also been anxious about homegrown extremism and the terror threat level was raised to high in September 2014.
Security officials estimate 110 Australians are fighting ISIS in the Middle East.
Police said the men were between 21 and 33 years old.
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Appearing in Cairns Magistrates Court today, magistrate Joe Pinder approved the extradition request, and the lawyer for the five men did not object.
