Ex-Marine fights extradition from Australia to U.S. over training Chinese pilots : NPR
In this undated photo provided by Saffrine Duggan, her husband Daniel Duggan poses for a photo at an undisclosed location in Australia.
Saffrine Duggan/Saffrine Duggan via AP
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Saffrine Duggan/Saffrine Duggan via AP
MELBOURNE, Australia — Former U.S. Marine Corps pilot Daniel Duggan on Thursday appealed his extradition from Australia to the United States over allegations he illegally trained Chinese military aviators more than a decade ago. Duggan is accused of training Chinese military pilots while working as an instructor for South Africa’s Test Flying Academy in 2012.
He attended Canberra court to appeal to his lawyer after traveling 350 kilometers (218 miles) from a prison in Wellington, New South Wales.
Australian Federal Court Judge James Stellios will announce his verdict on a date yet to be set, following a day-long hearing in Canberra, the nation’s capital.
A 2016 indictment from the U.S. District Court in Washington, which was unsealed in late 2022, alleges that Duggan conspired with others to provide training to Chinese military pilots in 2010 and 2012, and possibly at other times, without applying for a proper license.
Prosecutors say Duggan received about nine payments totaling about A$88,000 ($61,000) from another conspirator, as well as trips to the United States, South Africa and China for what was sometimes described as “personal development training.”
Duggan has denied the allegations, saying it was political posturing by the United States, which unfairly singled him out. He has been held in maximum security prisons since his arrest in 2022 at a supermarket near his family home in New South Wales.
Australia’s then-Attorney General Mark Dreyfus approved the 57-year-old’s extradition in December, but his lawyers argued in court on Thursday that the extradition process had legal flaws.
Dreyfus was replaced as attorney general in May by Michelle Rowland, who did not review her predecessor’s decision to send Boston-born Duggan back to the United States. »
The government notes the proceedings initiated today in the Federal Court regarding Mr. Duggan,” Rowland’s office said in a statement, adding that no further comment was appropriate as the matter was still before the courts.
Duggan’s wife and mother of his six children, Saffrine Duggan, told supporters outside court Thursday that Rowland “could release Dan at any time.”
“He is being used as a pawn in an ideological war between the United States and China and Australian government agencies have allowed this to happen and are willingly participating in it,” Saffrine Duggan said.
“My husband did not break any Australian laws and he was an Australian citizen at the time of the alleged pilot training.”
Daniel Duggan’s lawyer, Christopher Parkin, told the court it was “extraordinary” that a person could be extradited from Australia, accused of breaking US laws, for action in South Africa.
Duggan served in the US Marines for 12 years before migrating to Australia in 2002. He obtained Australian citizenship in January 2012, renouncing his US citizenship.
