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Refugee Update
Feb. 19th, 2018 10:00 amSmall numbers of refugees continue to escape Manus Island and Nauru for the United States. Despite this excellent news, thousands are still being left behind, in increasing desperation. Also in good news: last year, Australia accepted a record number of humanitarian arrivals.
Last Friday, a group of refugees on Manus Island were attacked, allegedly by members of the Papua New Guinea Defence Force.
We keep refouling people - deporting them to danger. This Tamil asylum seeker, who may be tortured in Sri Lanka, is just the latest example. Meanwhile on Manus, asylum seekers whose applications have been rejected are being told that they cannot be deported because of the danger to them in their home countries, but that they cannot settle on either Papua New Guinea nor in Australia. Plus the US is not taking people from its list of Muslim-majority countries. Where are these refugees supposed to go? The moon?
I've wanted to comment for some time on the latest group of our fellow Australians the rest of us are supposed to fear and hate: Sudanese immigrants. As it turns out, the supposed rash of crimes by "African gangs" was - I can't do better than Overland's headline: Total and utter racist bullshit. "Right from the beginning, the whole ‘African gangs’ beat-up relied on errors, distortions and flat-out lies."
Last Friday, a group of refugees on Manus Island were attacked, allegedly by members of the Papua New Guinea Defence Force.
We keep refouling people - deporting them to danger. This Tamil asylum seeker, who may be tortured in Sri Lanka, is just the latest example. Meanwhile on Manus, asylum seekers whose applications have been rejected are being told that they cannot be deported because of the danger to them in their home countries, but that they cannot settle on either Papua New Guinea nor in Australia. Plus the US is not taking people from its list of Muslim-majority countries. Where are these refugees supposed to go? The moon?
I've wanted to comment for some time on the latest group of our fellow Australians the rest of us are supposed to fear and hate: Sudanese immigrants. As it turns out, the supposed rash of crimes by "African gangs" was - I can't do better than Overland's headline: Total and utter racist bullshit. "Right from the beginning, the whole ‘African gangs’ beat-up relied on errors, distortions and flat-out lies."
