The refugees' actions erupted in resistance to the brutal Australian government policy, the most extreme in the world, of mandatory detention of all asylum-seekers who land without papers. The 582 children in detention include 53 unaccompanied minors. One-fifth of adult detainees are women, with or without their families. Some children born in detention have never seen the world outside the razor wire.

Despite Canberra's bluster that it has not deviated at all from its hard line, as we go to press on January 30 it appears the government has made some concessions to the protesters, leading them to suspend their hunger strike. This includes restarting the processing of Afghan and other visas, releasing some children, and possibly moving to phase out the worst detention center at Woomera.

The hunger strike, along with other protest actions by hundreds of men, women, and children seeking asylum in Australia, began January 15 in Woomera, located in the baking-hot South-Australian desert. Continual protests have occurred at the camp, where the largest number of long-term detainees are held. Reporters were passed a handwritten statement from seven hunger strikers which said: "Now more than 370 people have refused to eat.... Woomera is a hell hole; refugees are treated as animals."

There have been ongoing protests at all the detention centers, including mass breakouts in June 2000. Tear gas, water cannon, and other riot gear have been used frequently by the guards against protesters. On December 17 and 18 last year, protests climaxed with refugees setting fire to 21 buildings and huts at Woomera. An escape attempt was suppressed by guards.

Suicide attempts are commonplace by some inmates, depressed and maddened by months and even years of imprisonment in these detention camps. Toward the end of the hunger strike, 11 teenagers at Woomera made a suicide pact, threatening to kill themselves if they were not released. Other desperate acts have included people sewing their lips together. In the latest protests, up to 35 hunger strikers at Woomera, including teenagers, stitched their mouths. This is often done with a single stitch to the side of the mouth, symbolizing Canberra's attempts to stifle their voices.  
 

Attempts to demonize refugees

As part of his ongoing efforts to demonize the refugees in the eyes of other working people, Immigration Minister Philip Ruddock, without a shred of evidence, claimed that parents forced this painful protest on their children. Jalil, a 21-year-old Iranian held for a year, said immigration officials lied in blaming the parents. "Nobody would stitch their child's mouth. The children who are doing it are between 10 and 15 years old. They see their family doing it, so they do it," he said.

Others at Woomera ingested a cocktail of detergent or shampoo and paracetomol. Six were hospitalized. The January protests rapidly spread to other detention camps around the country.

At Port Hedland in the remote northwest of the continent, 17 detainees went on a hunger strike while protesters marched outside. At Curtin, four detainees joined the hunger strike, and six were hospitalized. At Maribyrnong in Melbourne, 22 detainees refused food, while 300 protesters gathered in support outside.

At the Sydney rally, a live mobile phone hookup with an Iranian detainee inside Villawood was translated to the crowd. He asked, "Why are we being treated like criminals?" Sister Susan Connelly of the Sisters of St. Joseph said it was important to challenge the ideas of "Pauline Hanson and her puppeteers." Hanson, the former head of the rightist One Nation Party, is a prominent anti-immigrant politician. Denny Faddoul, New South Wales President of the National Union of Students, pointed out that "nothing has changed since the White Australia Policy" and that Australia is "the only country on earth that locks up asylum-seekers." He labeled the government's actions "a disgrace." The White Australia Policy was aimed at administering immigration laws to ensure that non-Europeans were not admitted to the country.

Frustration at bureaucratic delays in the processing of visas boiled over when the Immigration Minister, Philip Ruddock, told the media there would be a freeze on the work as punishment for the December fire protests. Government spokespeople also said that Afghan people would have to return home now that the war to replace the Taliban regime is over.

Prime Minister John Howard has accused the hunger strikers of trying to "morally intimidate" his government. During the election campaign last year, in the midst of the war on Afghanistan, Howard, with thinly veiled racism, had smeared asylum seekers as possible terrorists. Howard and Ruddock have continually stood reality on its head, painting those on the receiving end of their government's inhuman policies as the criminals.

The issue is the most polarized in Australian politics but the ground has begun to shift. As the detainees have stood up for their dignity, gathering support from outside, and as international condemnation grows, numbers of prominent figures have taken their distance from Howard's intransigent line. In an embarrassment for the government, Neville Roach resigned in the midst of the hunger strike as chairman of the Council for Multicultural Australia, saying that Canberra was inflaming prejudice, not only against refugees, but against all those of Middle Eastern appearance.

The refugees suffer constant taunts to "go home," harassment and brutalization by center guards who call their rubber-coated batons "black Panadol"--a reference to a common painkilling drug. A government ombudsman concluded that the detained refugees have fewer rights than convicted criminals and that the guards, employed by a private company, were less accountable than prison wardens. They have the "right" to strip-search anyone older than 10.  
 
Polarization over detentions
As the Sydney protesters marched through neighborhood streets to the detention center on January 27, some onlookers jeered and others cheered, reflecting the sharp polarization over the issue.

One young wharfie (dockworker) who has worked for three years at Patrick, Port Botany, voiced a common sentiment when he told this correspondent that "if the refugees are allowed to just come in, we will all be working for $2 an hour." Other workers have reacted against the inhumanity of the government. Paul Keating, 34, also a wharfie at Patrick for two years and a member of the Labor Party, said, "We're talking about human rights and decency here. These people are coming from a desperate situation but they've been demonized."

The new Labor opposition leader, Simon Crean, broke his silence on the issue after two weeks, trying to keep up bipartisan support for the government on "border protection" while criticizing Howard's breach of bipartisanship on "multiculturalism." Crean offered belated "compassion" for "innocent children behind razor wire," proposing that children and mothers be released into the community.

It was a Labor government that introduced mandatory detention of refugees without papers. For two-thirds of the 20th century, the White Australia policy was inscribed in Labor's platform. Only in the 1970s and '80s did this change to support for "multiculturalism." Like the party as a whole, Labor's frontbench is divided over the issue.

A national protest has been called for February 12 for the opening session outside Parliament House in Canberra, with wide endorsement from former detainees and refugee rights, church, community, and political organizations.

Ron Poulsen is a member of the Maritime Union of Australia. Joanne Kuniansky, a member of the Australasian Meat Employees Union, contributed to this article.
 
 
Related article:
Australia: Open the borders!  
 
 
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