Gang rape convictions show Sydney's deep racial tensions

By BILLY ADAMS Herald correspondent

SYDNEY - A pack of young men embark on a two-month reign of sexual terror involving at least seven teenage girls.

One of the victims is lured from a train before being subjected to a horrifying ordeal over six hours at three separate locations.

She is raped and sexually assaulted up to 25 times by 14 attackers. The perpetrators call friends or send text messages urging others to "come and join us".

Fourteen youths, aged between 16 and 20, have now been convicted or pleaded guilty over the gang rapes and sexual assaults, which took place in Sydney in August and September 2000. But the fact that every one of them was Muslim of Lebanese descent - and their victims Caucasian - has exposed deep racial divisions in a city renowned for its multi-culturalism.

After the latest convictions last week, Sun-Herald newspaper columnist Miranda Devine left readers in no doubt of her view of the motives.

"These were racist crimes. They were hate crimes. The rapists chose their victims on the basis of race. That fact is crucial to the story.

"If the perpetrators had been Anglo-Celtic Australians, the furore would have been enormous. No newspaper would have left out that fact and you can bet the guilt and shame would have spread far and wide."

The paper, which broke the story last year, said Middle Eastern gangs motivated by ethnic hatred were systematically abducting and raping young Caucasian women in the western suburb of Bankstown.

However, out of 150 districts in New South Wales, Bankstown ranked 94th for sexual assaults in 2000, with a lower rate than the Sydney and state average.

The NSW Bureau of Crime says the rate of sexual assaults in Bankstown has been stable since 1995 - about 10 offences a month.

The only change to that pattern came in June 1999 when 70 reports of sexual assault were recorded. Most of those were found to be caused by one man who was jailed for wilful and obscene exposure offences.

While leaders of Sydney's large Lebanese population have roundly condemned the gang rapists, they insist the whole community has been demonised by the isolated acts of a few criminals whose actions had nothing to do with race.

Relations worsened with the Tampa refugee ship crisis and September 11.

The city's Lebanese Muslim Association reported high levels of abuse against community members up until November. Last week's convictions reignited the furore, prompting one Lebanese leader to describe the ethnic labelling of her community as "racialised rape".