Australia’s top spy opens up on nation’s Neo-Nazi problem – but warns of an even greater threat

The country’s top spy has confirmed neo-Nazis are growing in Australia – but warned the biggest threat to national security remains espionage.

Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) head Mike Burgess said neo-Nazis were staging public displays more often but monitoring these groups still didn’t form the bulk of his organisation’s caseload.

Appearing before a Senate estimates hearing on Tuesday, Mr Burgess said he had briefed Anthony Albanese after he claimed last week that right-wing extremism had ‘for some time’ posed the strongest identified threat to Australia’s security.

‘It’s a sign that those groups are more emboldened and able to come out publicly in their recruitment to push their what they believe in and recruit to their cause,’ he said.

‘Does that mean there’s been an increase in the numbers of them? I don’t necessarily see that correlation.’

However, Mr Burgess said ASIO had witnessed a rise in the number of people who were drawn to neo-Nazi ideology for reasons the organisation didn’t ‘fully understand’.

He revealed ASIO’s counter-terrorism investigation caseload dedicated to ideologically-motivated extremism, including the neo-Nazi movement, had grown over the past seven years from five per cent to about 30 per cent.