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Australia delays departure for Bangladesh tour amid security warning
Posted On Oct 01 2015
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The team was due to leave Sydney on Monday but will now wait for further security advice.
As per schedule, Australia play the first of the two Tests against Bangladesh in Dhaka from October 9.
CA CEO James Sutherland, during a press conference in Brisbane yesterday, noted that the travel advice was for ordinary Australians travelling in Bangladesh, and the Australian cricket team would have extremely high levels of security if the tour went ahead.
Sunday’s planned departure was blocked after the foreign affairs ministry in Canberra warned that “militants may be planning to target Australian interests”.
DFAT, which provides travel advice to Australians planning to go overseas, issued a fresh one on Bangladesh on Friday.
“We will then make a judgement on what the likely scenario, in terms of the team’s departure or not is, and then make decisions from there”, he said. “When the time comes and we’ve laid it all out and if people are still very nervous, we’ll be wary of that”, Howard concluded.
The 15-man squad for the tour of Bangladesh, captained by Steve Smith, was announced on September 14, with eight of those players featuring from the recently failed Ashes campaign in the United Kingdom.
” We advise you to exercise a high degree of caution in Bangladesh due to the uncertain political and security situation”, the DFAT said.
CA’s decision to proceed with the Test series will depend on the outcome of meetings between its security chief Sean Carroll and government and police officials in Bangladesh.
“In the meantime, we are working with the ACA and keeping our players and support staff fully informed”, he added.
The two-Test series between Australia and Bangladesh is due to start on October 17.
The home minister told reporters, “We’ve told them about our safety measures and assured them that they won’t face any security risk in Bangladesh”. “We’re also liaising with our security experts, CA and FICA – as the peak body for cricket player associations”.
