Irfan Yusuf: Terrorist tag still sticks even when cause is won

The Cold War was still as hot as ever when US President Ronald Reagan placed the ANC on an official list of terrorist organisations. Photo / AP

Two men have been arrested in Sydney on charges under Australia's foreign incursion laws that forbid citizens fighting alongside armed rebel groups. George Brandis, Australia's Attorney-General, remarked that the arrests served as a reminder that those who become involved in foreign conflicts pose a threat to national security.

Brandis feared young people were becoming "radicalised". He was quoted in the Guardian: "I am concerned about the radicalisation of Australians as a result of the Syrian conflict, particularly those who return to Australia with the capabilities acquired through fighting or training with extremist groups."

Radical. Terrorist. These labels are so often bandied about, as if recognising them is clear as daylight. If young men fight against a regime known to use chemical weapons against its citizens, a regime which many Western governments wish to see the back of, should they be classed as terrorists or radicals? And what moral authority do their accusers possess?

Perhaps the passing of Nelson Mandela, South Africa's first black President, may be an appropriate time to consider exactly who gets to be labelled a terrorist and radical, and why.

Mandela led the African National Congress in an armed struggle against a brutal racist regime. Apartheid came into being in South Africa in 1948.

The ANC's struggle dismantled apartheid in 1994, a mere five years after the fall of the Berlin Wall that divided Europe along Cold War lines.

The South African anti-apartheid struggle took place during the Cold War, a time when radicalism and terrorism was defined not by religious affiliation but by support for or affinity to communism.

The ANC was regarded by many in the West as a radical organisation that no self-respecting person could support, let alone join. Its partners in struggle included groups such as as the United Democratic Front (UDF) and the Pan-Africanist Congress. But it also included the South African Communist Party (SACP).

One of Mandela's closest allies in the anti-apartheid movement was Ahmad Kathrada. In an interview with PBS, Ahmad Kathrada acknowledges Mandela was hostile to communism. Kathrada had known Mandela since the 1940s, spent time imprisoned with him on Robben Island and was himself active in the SACP. Kathrada was of Muslim heritage, but this didn't stop him from working with Jewish colleagues such as Joe Slovo.

The strong presence of communists in the anti-apartheid movement meant the ANC soon was shunned in the Free World. After years of struggle, Mandela was forced into hiding and was arrested in 1962.

It is widely believed that the CIA provided South African intelligence services with crucial information that led to Mandela's arrest. The New York Times states that at the time of Mandela's arrest, the CIA had devoted more resources to monitoring and catching him than South Africa's own intelligence services. America's hero President John F. Kennedy must have had some knowledge of the CIA's South African activities at the time.

The Cold War was still as hot as ever when US President Ronald Reagan placed the ANC on an official list of terrorist organisations. Reagan even described South Africa's apartheid regime in 1981 as "essential to the free world".

Throughout this time, Reagan and his CIA underlings were supporting and funding jihadi groups in Afghanistan. Among those supported was a young man from a Saudi business family who helped organise Arab volunteer fighters. That man's name was Osama bin Laden.

Conservative leaders across the Western world were happy to jump into bed with anyone who fought communism, whether these be white supremacists, tinpot dictators or religious fanatics. But any freedom movement, regardless of how noble their cause, was opposed if they had some link to communism. In October 1987, Margaret Thatcher was quick to dismiss the African National Congress as "a typical terrorist organisation".

One British Conservative MP exercised little restraint when he declared that "Nelson Mandela should be shot". When asked about this some years later, he said Mandela was an "ex-terrorist".

CIA support for bin Ladin's fanatics in Afghanistan came back to haunt the US. When the two planes crashed into the Twin Towers in 2001, Osama bin Ladin was already a proscribed terrorist under US law. Then again, so was Mandela.

When awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, Mandela remained a proscribed terrorist. Indeed, throughout the period of Mandela's term as President of a free, democratic and racially unsegregated South Africa, he was on a US terrorist watch list. He was only taken off the list in 2008 when he was about to turn 90.

Who can disagree with the words of Bob Egelko in the San Francisco Chronicle: "Mandela the terrorist and Mandela the hero were the same person. It was the world around him that changed."

In 20 years' time, who knows how conventional political wisdom will view those fighting for or against the Assad regime in Syria? In a world where political and purse strings are likely to be pulled in places like Shanghai, Taipei and Hong Kong, where civilised people will want to learn Mandarin or Cantonese, who knows how people will view even the most liberal of our current Western political prejudices. At that time, who knows who will be a radical or terrorist.

Irfan Yusuf is an Australian lawyer and award-winning author.