The protest was one more signal that resistance to the treatment of refugees by Prime Minister John Howard's conservative government is growing. Working people and others who have been locked up in inhuman conditions in these camps have staged protests, including hunger strikes, to force a change in government policy. With this courageous stand they have begun to force debate in the opposition Australian Labour Party (ALP) over the government's intransigent stance and, to a lesser degree, in the ruling Liberal Party.

They have also gained support within broader layers of the working class and from defenders of democratic rights. On February 2, for example, thousands rallied in Perth, Sydney, and Melbourne to oppose the mandatory detentions.

To welcome the crowd to Aboriginal land, a delegation from the Aboriginal Tent Embassy marched to the platform holding high their land rights flags. In her welcome, Wadjularbinna, an Aboriginal elder, said that everyone at the rally was "standing on Aboriginal land. Racism did not start with the refugees" but with the British settler invasion in 1788. "I understand the plight of refugees. I've been there myself," she said. "We are refugees in our own land, put in compounds surrounded by barbed wire. My law and my land would not allow this treatment of refugees if we were in charge."  
 
'Free all asylum seekers'
Refugees from Afghanistan and Iraq addressed the crowd. Ahmad Reze Wakil, who fled Afghanistan in 1999, explained that he has become active in the Free the Refugee Campaign in Sydney after spending nine months in the Curtin detention center in Western Australia. Ahmad rebutted the Howard government's claim that it is now safe to return to Afghanistan--the pretext used in the suspension of the processing of Afghan refugees' applications for asylum that sparked the January hunger strike at the Woomera detention center.

"The problem in Afghanistan was not only due to the Taliban," he said. "The new ruling group put in power by U.S. intervention has a brutal history. They are war criminals from the Mujahadeen government in power before the Taliban. We cannot rest until all asylum seekers and refugees are freed."

Speakers addressed the rally from a variety of groups, including Amnesty International; Rural Australians for Refugees; the Federation of Ethnic Community Councils of Australia; Free the Refugee Campaign; Refugee Action Campaign; and the United Nations Association of Australia.

Rural Australians for Refugees gathered under a banner that read, "Put yourself in their shoes. When you know the facts you will open your heart." Groups held handmade signs from more than half a dozen country towns, mainly in New South Wales.

The scattered banners carried by unionists included the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union; New South Wales Teachers Federation; Australian Education Union; and the Trades and Labour Council of the ACT (Australian Capital Territory).

"Human rights are not a popularity contest," said Sharon Burrow, president of the Australian Council of Trade Unions. "No other nation locks up asylum seekers like Australia does. No other nation raids ships at sea to enforce domestic policy. The unions oppose mandatory detention and oppose the so-called Pacific solution."  
 
Issue is at center of politics
The issue of mandatory detention of asylum seekers has been at the center of politics here for the past six months since the Norwegian merchant vessel Tampa was refused permission to dock on Australian territory after rescuing 438 refugees from a sinking boat.

Canberra sent 50 troops from the Special Air Services unit of the Australian armed forces to board the Tampa August 29. After this military show of force and a weeklong standoff, the Australian government transported the majority of the asylum seekers to the Pacific Island nation of Nauru, with 150 sent to New Zealand. The "Pacific solution" refers to the Howard government's plan to send boat people intercepted at sea to refugee camps now set up in Papua New Guinea and Nauru.

The federal election last November centered around the refugee issue, with both the incumbent Liberal-National party coalition government and the opposition ALP calling for tougher border protection and maintaining mandatory detention of refugees.

At the rally, speakers from the Australian Democrats, the Greens, and the ALP all condemned the policy, which currently sees thousands of refugees imprisoned behind razor-wire fences at detention centers in remote places. The dozen Labour MPs who attended the rally included Carmen Lawrence, Duncan Kerr, and other prominent politicians. Within the ALP, divisions over refugee policy following the federal elections are increasingly visible. Tanya Plibersek, an ALP Member of Parliament from Sydney, spoke at the rally representing the newly formed Labour for Refugees which has gathered support in a number of party branches.

A message was sent to the rally by Greg Barns, a former senior ministerial staff person in the Howard government, whose endorsement as a candidate by the Tasmanian Liberal Party has been withdrawn because of his criticism of the government's refugee policy. He called mandatory detention "inexcusable" and accused the government of "using desperate people for its own political purposes."

The crowd included a number of high school students who took the day off to participate. Brendan Mcgloin, who is 18 and attends Canberra College, was there with three friends. He said that he had handed out leaflets at school for a few weeks because "I'm appalled at the government's policy. It makes me ashamed to be Australian." Sarah, who came with two classmates from a high school in the Blue Mountains, said, "This is an important day to show support. More people in Australia support refugees than people realize."

Alasdair Macdonald is a member of the Young Socialists in Sydney.  
 
 
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