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Weekly Refugee Posting 4: Australia
Jan. 28th, 2014 01:41 pmNow finally to the country which is the source of all the trouble*, ie, Australia.
First, steel yourself: He knocked at the front door only to have it slammed in his face.
Meanwhile on Christmas Island, detainees are self-harming, attempting suicide, and engaging in hunger strikes. Senator Sarah Hanson-Young reports that children are receiving no schooling and are becoming mentally ill. The Senator stated: "When I was in Jordan in the Za'atari camp, with 120,000 Syrian refugees, they feel safe and the whole camp is run to help people. Here people are being punished and they know they're being punished. The attitude is very different." MP Clive Palmer, who opposes the detention of children, wants to visit the camp.
The Australian government continues to hide what it's doing with asylum seekers as best it can, with Immigration Minister Scott Morrison no longer holding weekly media briefings, and the Minister's own briefings also being kept under wraps. Former Liberal Party leader John Hewson has criticised the current policy of "stonewalling". A Senate Committee is investigating the guvmint's failure to disclose information to the upper house.
Given this, how can we assess the truth of the government's claim last Friday that no asylum seekers had reached Australia's shores by boat for a record thirty-six days?
You have to wonder why they're bothering to keep everything secret, when - as former Prime Minister Malcolm Frazer notes - the constant propaganda has been successful; most Australians believe the opposite of the truth - that asylum seekers are fakes - and want them treated more harshly. (As we are already torturing them, not to mention endangering their families, it's hard to see how this could be accomplished, short of actually feeding them to sharks.)
Well, maybe it's because our treatment of asylum seekers has earned us the criticism of Human Rights Watch, and in fact could possibly be criminal.
* Is it fair to call Australia "the source of all the trouble"? What about the nations whose human rights abuses create refugees in the first place? Australia collaborates with them (Sri Lanka currently, Iran in the past). What about Indonesia, which refuses to resettle refugees? We're a wealthy country right next door, which could easily absorb thousands of them. We're not the only guilty ones - but our human rights failings support everyone else's.
First, steel yourself: He knocked at the front door only to have it slammed in his face.
Meanwhile on Christmas Island, detainees are self-harming, attempting suicide, and engaging in hunger strikes. Senator Sarah Hanson-Young reports that children are receiving no schooling and are becoming mentally ill. The Senator stated: "When I was in Jordan in the Za'atari camp, with 120,000 Syrian refugees, they feel safe and the whole camp is run to help people. Here people are being punished and they know they're being punished. The attitude is very different." MP Clive Palmer, who opposes the detention of children, wants to visit the camp.
The Australian government continues to hide what it's doing with asylum seekers as best it can, with Immigration Minister Scott Morrison no longer holding weekly media briefings, and the Minister's own briefings also being kept under wraps. Former Liberal Party leader John Hewson has criticised the current policy of "stonewalling". A Senate Committee is investigating the guvmint's failure to disclose information to the upper house.
Given this, how can we assess the truth of the government's claim last Friday that no asylum seekers had reached Australia's shores by boat for a record thirty-six days?
You have to wonder why they're bothering to keep everything secret, when - as former Prime Minister Malcolm Frazer notes - the constant propaganda has been successful; most Australians believe the opposite of the truth - that asylum seekers are fakes - and want them treated more harshly. (As we are already torturing them, not to mention endangering their families, it's hard to see how this could be accomplished, short of actually feeding them to sharks.)
Well, maybe it's because our treatment of asylum seekers has earned us the criticism of Human Rights Watch, and in fact could possibly be criminal.
* Is it fair to call Australia "the source of all the trouble"? What about the nations whose human rights abuses create refugees in the first place? Australia collaborates with them (Sri Lanka currently, Iran in the past). What about Indonesia, which refuses to resettle refugees? We're a wealthy country right next door, which could easily absorb thousands of them. We're not the only guilty ones - but our human rights failings support everyone else's.
