Weekly Refugee Posting 1: Manus Island
Feb. 28th, 2014 10:08 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dreamer_easyPapua New Guinean police continue to investigate the murder of Reza Berati, the young asylum seeker killed at the Manus Island detention centre last week. No arrests have yet been made. In this posting I want to try to outline the information we have so far as clearly as I can.
Their preliminary report states that:
A contractor describes an improvised hospital outside the staff accomodation block: "They were just makeshift beds. Transferees were carried in on sheets. Blood everywhere, crying. There were 30 or 40 clients down there. We had gunshot wounds, some with head injuries." A detainee told the contractor: "I did nothing, I wasn't involved in the protests, I was in my room, being good, trying to sleep. They came in my room... they dragged me out of my bed and beat me. They had huge rocks in their hands and they hit my head and my body with them." (This Guardian article also raises the question of which fences were pushed down and by whom.)
Migration agent Liz Thompson, who was present during the violence, resigned when told the official Immigration line was that Berati had been killed outside the camp. (As you'll probably be aware, this was the Immigration Minister's initial claim until he "corrected the record" five days later.)
A guard's report written the morning after states that PNG policed entered the detention centre, leaving at about the same time the officer in charge of G4S guards "lost control" of them.
Azita Bokan, formerly translator at the centre, describes a clash on the Sunday night between guards who picked up rocks and metal table legs to use as weapons, and detainees armed with fruit and plastic chairs. On Monday morning, she witnessed what she believes was a "brain dead" man, his face beaten to a pulp, being brought in a wheelchair to the medical centre. When the patient's friend would not relinquish the chair to G4S guards, seven of them attacked him. (After she confronted the guards, Immigration fired her on the spot.) That night, from the roof of the staff accommodation she saw injured detainees, including one with a severe head injury who apparently was DOA and another with a slashed neck.
To sum up, the accounts so far converge on one narrative
Their preliminary report states that:
- Berati was killed by multiple blows to the head, probably with a piece of timber, which caused a blood clot on his brain.
- Local G4S guards were involved in the attack on the detainees; PNG police and local villagers were not.
- The detainees did not leave the compound; the violence took place inside it.
- Two other young Iranian men with serious injuries (one to the back, one to the abdomen) were also taken to hospital.
- Some G4S guards were also attacked. (According to the witness below, some were injured by stones and some by detainees fighting back.)
- PNG police fired warning shots into the air. (How one detainee was shot in the buttocks when police only fired warning shots has yet to be explained.)
A contractor describes an improvised hospital outside the staff accomodation block: "They were just makeshift beds. Transferees were carried in on sheets. Blood everywhere, crying. There were 30 or 40 clients down there. We had gunshot wounds, some with head injuries." A detainee told the contractor: "I did nothing, I wasn't involved in the protests, I was in my room, being good, trying to sleep. They came in my room... they dragged me out of my bed and beat me. They had huge rocks in their hands and they hit my head and my body with them." (This Guardian article also raises the question of which fences were pushed down and by whom.)
Migration agent Liz Thompson, who was present during the violence, resigned when told the official Immigration line was that Berati had been killed outside the camp. (As you'll probably be aware, this was the Immigration Minister's initial claim until he "corrected the record" five days later.)
A guard's report written the morning after states that PNG policed entered the detention centre, leaving at about the same time the officer in charge of G4S guards "lost control" of them.
Azita Bokan, formerly translator at the centre, describes a clash on the Sunday night between guards who picked up rocks and metal table legs to use as weapons, and detainees armed with fruit and plastic chairs. On Monday morning, she witnessed what she believes was a "brain dead" man, his face beaten to a pulp, being brought in a wheelchair to the medical centre. When the patient's friend would not relinquish the chair to G4S guards, seven of them attacked him. (After she confronted the guards, Immigration fired her on the spot.) That night, from the roof of the staff accommodation she saw injured detainees, including one with a severe head injury who apparently was DOA and another with a slashed neck.
To sum up, the accounts so far converge on one narrative
- The protesters were dissing and throwing stones at PNG G4S staff, who were outside the detention centre.
- PNG police fired warning shots; detainees, frightened, returned to their rooms.
- Then the G4S guards went into the centre, dragged detainees from their rooms, and attacked them - inviting local residents to join them in the assault.
no subject
Date: 2014-03-01 05:12 am (UTC)So far I think Shaun Micallef has come up with the best line for this:
"The ABC promise that they shall never play a Scott Morrison press conference again, and shall more carefully verify their sources in the future".
Quite.
no subject
Date: 2014-03-01 07:03 am (UTC)