Refugee Update
Oct. 23rd, 2016 11:11 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dreamer_easyA lot happened this week:
The ABC's current affairs program Four Corners (18 October) ran an expose on Nauru, The Forgotten Children, in which child refugees were secretly asked to speak about their experiences of detention. Politicians and the media pushed back hard. Teacher Tracey Donehue responded powerfully, and the ABC stood by its reporting.
Amnesty International released a new report, Australia: Island of Despair: Australia's "processing" of refugees on Nauru, on 17 October, telling the Guardian Australia: "What we see in Nauru essentially amounts to torture – a system set up to cause deliberate harm to people." The SMH summarised some of the refugees' stories. A New York Times editorial, Australia's Stranded Refugee Prisoners, responded to the report, calling Australia's 'ruthlessly efficient policy' a 'disgrace'.
Doctors freed to speak about Australia's detention regime after U-turn after Amendment signed into law on 30 September (GA, 20 October 2016) | Teachers, social workers demand right to talk about offshore detention centres (GA, 21 October 2016)
'Fear, censorship and retaliation': United Nations rapporteur slams Australia's human rights record (GA, 18 October 2016)
'Trauma and tragedy': Australian detention centre staff to get 'resilience training' (SMH, 18 October 2016)
Nauru files dominate Senate hearing as third detention facility in PNG revealed (GA, 17 October 2016) | New transfer centre for detained asylum seekers set for construction, PNG Government says (ABC, 18 October 2016)
Looking for more information about the suicide of Omid Ali Avaz in March last year brought me to something I didn't know existed: the Australian Border Deaths Database, which "maintains a record of all known deaths associated with Australia’s borders since 1 January 2000".
Catching up on links:
Villawood: Notes from an Immigration Detention Centre (The Shipping News, 5 March 2015)
Police investigate alleged gang-rape inside Villawood detention centre (SMH, 16 August 2016)
Australia's shameful treatment of Sayed Abdellatif (GA, 8 December 2015) Have I used the word 'Kafka-esque' lately?
One man's journey to despair (The Age, 8 June 2014) "Refugee Leo Seemanpillai's journal opens the pages to a gentle, tortured soul."
How Mohammad Nasim Najafi died in a detention centre (The Saturday Paper, 8 August 2015). "Overcrowded prisons mean half of the detainees at the [Yongah Hill Immigration Detention Centre] are convicted criminals rather than asylum seekers."
The ABC's current affairs program Four Corners (18 October) ran an expose on Nauru, The Forgotten Children, in which child refugees were secretly asked to speak about their experiences of detention. Politicians and the media pushed back hard. Teacher Tracey Donehue responded powerfully, and the ABC stood by its reporting.
Amnesty International released a new report, Australia: Island of Despair: Australia's "processing" of refugees on Nauru, on 17 October, telling the Guardian Australia: "What we see in Nauru essentially amounts to torture – a system set up to cause deliberate harm to people." The SMH summarised some of the refugees' stories. A New York Times editorial, Australia's Stranded Refugee Prisoners, responded to the report, calling Australia's 'ruthlessly efficient policy' a 'disgrace'.
Doctors freed to speak about Australia's detention regime after U-turn after Amendment signed into law on 30 September (GA, 20 October 2016) | Teachers, social workers demand right to talk about offshore detention centres (GA, 21 October 2016)
'Fear, censorship and retaliation': United Nations rapporteur slams Australia's human rights record (GA, 18 October 2016)
'Trauma and tragedy': Australian detention centre staff to get 'resilience training' (SMH, 18 October 2016)
Nauru files dominate Senate hearing as third detention facility in PNG revealed (GA, 17 October 2016) | New transfer centre for detained asylum seekers set for construction, PNG Government says (ABC, 18 October 2016)
Looking for more information about the suicide of Omid Ali Avaz in March last year brought me to something I didn't know existed: the Australian Border Deaths Database, which "maintains a record of all known deaths associated with Australia’s borders since 1 January 2000".
Catching up on links:
Villawood: Notes from an Immigration Detention Centre (The Shipping News, 5 March 2015)
Police investigate alleged gang-rape inside Villawood detention centre (SMH, 16 August 2016)
Australia's shameful treatment of Sayed Abdellatif (GA, 8 December 2015) Have I used the word 'Kafka-esque' lately?
One man's journey to despair (The Age, 8 June 2014) "Refugee Leo Seemanpillai's journal opens the pages to a gentle, tortured soul."
How Mohammad Nasim Najafi died in a detention centre (The Saturday Paper, 8 August 2015). "Overcrowded prisons mean half of the detainees at the [Yongah Hill Immigration Detention Centre] are convicted criminals rather than asylum seekers."
