Vol. 80/No. 9 March 7, 2016
Australia: Actions condemn
‘offshore’ refugee detention
Since 2012 the Australian government has detained refugees arriving here by boat at “processing” camps on Nauru or on Manus Island in Papua New Guinea. If they are granted asylum, they are forced to stay in those countries or resettle in Cambodia.
The refugees currently facing deportation, most of whom are from the Middle East and South Asia, include more than 90 infants and other children, several of whom were born in Australia.
“The High Court decision settled nothing,” Ian Rintoul, an organizer for the Refugee Action Coalition, told some 500 outside the Immigration department offices here Feb. 4. Denouncing off-shore refugee processing as “ethically and morally wrong,” he said the ultimate decision would be made not “in the High Court but on the streets.”
Common slogans at the rallies were “Let them stay!” and “Not in my name!” While some placards focused solely on the issue of children in detention, others read “Close Manus and Nauru! Not fit for children, not fit for anyone!”
The detention center on Manus Island was declared legal by the High Court in 2014. Papua New Guinea is one of the most underdeveloped countries in the world, in spite of vast mineral wealth extracted mainly by Australian mining conglomerates. It was a colony of Australia until 1975.
Nauru, with a population of just 10,000, gained formal independence in 1968. “Australian companies ripped the phosphate out of Nauru and profited from it,” Rintoul reminded the protesters. The recent doubling of Australian government “aid” to Nauru “has gone to the detention center. The people of Nauru have seen nothing,” he added.
Responding to Canberra’s claims that detainees are now able to freely move about Nauru, Rintoul pointed out, “Nauru is a very small island, about the size of Melbourne airport. There is nowhere to go.”
Speakers told several thousand who rallied here Feb. 8 about dangerous conditions at the detention centers, including violence by security guards and other physical and sexual abuse. Refugees in Nauru have reported conditions can be even worse outside the camps.
Following the High Court ruling, Liberal Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull declared he would proceed with the deportations in the name of discouraging “people-smugglers.”
Protesters picketed the New South Wales Labor opposition’s state conference Feb. 13 protesting federal Labor’s support to the government’s course. The Manus and Nauru centers were set up by the former Labor government.
Teachers, students and others have rallied outside a school in Victoria where some refugees are studying. Staff and others kept up a vigil against the deportations at a Brisbane hospital where a baby born in Australia, known as Asha, is being treated. On Feb. 21, in an effort to defuse the protests, Immigration Minister Peter Dutton announced that Asha and her family would be released into temporary “community detention.”
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