The wife of an Australian citizen and former US military pilot who was detained a year ago on suspicion of instructing Chinese airmen has demanded that the Albanese administration free him.
On October 21, 2022, Daniel Edmund Duggan, 55, was taken into custody in a rural area of New South Wales. The US government had accused him of supplying weaponry to Chinese pilots in South Africa between 2010 and 2012.
He is also charged with using his US citizenship to launder money.The six-parent father disputes every allegation.
Ahead of Duggan’s court appearance on Monday, where his attorneys will seek to have his extradition hearing—scheduled for November 24—vacated, Duggan’s wife, Saffrine, has called on the authorities to release her husband.
When Prime Minister Anthony Albanese meets US President Joe Biden in Washington, DC, for talks next week, she requested him to bring up her husband’s arrest.
“We demand they reject the advice of faceless departmental bureaucrats in Canberra,” she stated.
“We insist that they cease withholding information that is essential to Dan’s freedom.
“We want an end to the secrecy and deceit that have tainted this case from the start, as well as transparency.
“And we request that the prime minister convey, during his visit to the US, his opposition to Dan Duggan’s extradition.
“A message that Dan is being returned to his family where he belongs as an Australian citizen.”
Police in Orange, a small town in New South Wales, temporarily detained Duggan in a supermarket parking lot. He is currently being held in Lithgow Correctional Centre.
After being arrested twelve months ago, he is still in solitary confinement, spending little time outside of his cell save for a Sunday one-hour visitation with relatives.
Attorney Dennis Miralis for Duggan stated that it is a “long-standing concern” that government agencies have not produced thousands of papers that have been requested and are essential to his case.
“That material is crucial to Dan’s right to defend himself and crucial to the argument set down that seeks to raise his defence in extradition hearing,” he stated.
“If this material is not going to be produced in the first instance, it’s not possible to rely upon this material at a later point in time.”This material is therefore extremely important.”
