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dreamer_easyMore on the Cornelia Rau fiasco: Asylum seekers saved Australian woman from indefinite imprisonment (Australian Democrats press release). It took six guards in riot gear to force her, screaming in terror, into her cell. Had asylum seekers locked up in Baxter not urged their friends on the outside to help, she might still be there, spending up to 20 hours a day in isolation.
Mental illness is, not surprisingly, normal in detention centres, where traumatised people are held indefinitely without charge or trial. (A researcher was paid to try and discredit research into this.)
What a forced deportation looks like: "The man had layers of black gaffer tape around his mouth, bound so tightly that it was cutting into his face. Above the tape, his eyes were wildly panicked. They locked on to mine briefly before he was manhandled into the seat, and a blindfold placed over his eyes."
Perhaps he was being deported to Iran, a nation notorious for human rights abuse, with whom Australia has an Memorandum of Understanding so we can forcibly return asylum seekers.
A slight majority of Australians still support mandatory detention. Some may not be aware of alternatives to mandatory detention, as briefly outlined by Liberal backbencher Petro Georgiou: "If we have determined that asylum seekers are healthy, not a danger to the public and unlikely to abscond, there is no good reason why they cannot be released until their status is determined. Release can be subject to monitoring conditions if necessary." (In other words, brief detention for identity, medical, and criminal checks is perfectly reasonable, and only those likely to vanish need to be kept locked up.)
Meanwhile, the government will spend $336 million of taxpayer's money on a new detention centre on Christmas Island.
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refugeenews
Mental illness is, not surprisingly, normal in detention centres, where traumatised people are held indefinitely without charge or trial. (A researcher was paid to try and discredit research into this.)
What a forced deportation looks like: "The man had layers of black gaffer tape around his mouth, bound so tightly that it was cutting into his face. Above the tape, his eyes were wildly panicked. They locked on to mine briefly before he was manhandled into the seat, and a blindfold placed over his eyes."
Perhaps he was being deported to Iran, a nation notorious for human rights abuse, with whom Australia has an Memorandum of Understanding so we can forcibly return asylum seekers.
A slight majority of Australians still support mandatory detention. Some may not be aware of alternatives to mandatory detention, as briefly outlined by Liberal backbencher Petro Georgiou: "If we have determined that asylum seekers are healthy, not a danger to the public and unlikely to abscond, there is no good reason why they cannot be released until their status is determined. Release can be subject to monitoring conditions if necessary." (In other words, brief detention for identity, medical, and criminal checks is perfectly reasonable, and only those likely to vanish need to be kept locked up.)
Meanwhile, the government will spend $336 million of taxpayer's money on a new detention centre on Christmas Island.
x-posted to
refugeenews
