Mehmet Bibir, who was arrested during counter-terrorism raids, says most days were spent lying around or kicking a football

This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

A Sydney man who travelled to Syria and later pleaded guilty to engaging in hostile activities insists he was “extremely bored” and never went near any fighting.

Mehmet Biber was arrested during counter-terrorism raids in Sydney in November 2016, after he travelled to Syria in July 2013. He returned to Australia in February 2014 and was the subject of a lengthy investigation before being charged with entering a foreign state intending hostile activity.

Biber, now 25, pleaded guilty in February and on Friday had a sentence hearing in the New South Wales supreme court at Parramatta. He said he travelled to the war-torn region after seeing videos of women and children suffering under the Assad regime.

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“That hit me in the heart because I had a wife [who] was pregnant at the time as well,” Biber told the court.

One of Biber’s friends introduced him to a man who had connections in Syria and organised for him to join a group travelling there via Turkey. He recalled having “tunnel vision” and clouded judgment.

“I was thinking about all those atrocities,” he said on Friday.

Biber met a member of the Ahrar al-Sham group on the Syrian border whose members – mostly locals – were not as extreme as other rebels in ideology or religion, he said. The group was very protective of the Australians and shielded them from any prospects of fighting, he said.

“We were extremely bored,” Biber said, claiming most days were spent lying around or kicking a football with local children.

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He denied ever fighting but admitted he would have tried if given the chance.

Biber was asked about a photograph sent back to Australia showing him in a group of nine men holding assault weapons. Biber was asked during cross-examination why they were dressed in black with only their eyes showing.

“Because it looked cool,” he replied. “We thought it looked cool.”

Biber insisted he had simply grabbed a gun off guards to pose for the photograph and did not want people back in Australia to think he was a fighter.

“If I did, I wouldn’t have covered my face,” he said. “These days, my generation takes photos of everything they do.”

Biber said that about one month into his trip, he visited Raqqa and began to have doubts.

“By then I’d achieved nothing,” he said. “If anything I was a burden to these people, feeding me and taking us around, practically treating us like kids – pretty much babysitting us.”



Biber has been in custody since his 2016 arrest and says his time in jail has been hard on his family, including his now four-year-old daughter.

“I just want to put it behind me, hopefully, and get on with my life,” he said.

The hearing, before Justice Christine Adamson, continues.