ChilOut Media Releases.
Minister for Immigration's 2006 Media Releases.
Australian Democrats press releases for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs.
Andrew Bartlett, Australian Democrats Senator - Blog.
Bob Brown, Leader of The
Greens, Media Releases.
Kerry
Nettle, Greens Senator.
Please visit our news archive for older news items. See also the immigration section in The Age, an up-to-date source of news items on asylum seekers and detainees. There is also a section in the Sydney Morning Herald.
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Burmese asylum seekers sent to Nauru
The Immigration Department has revived using Nauru Island for its Pacific Solution policy by transferring seven Burmese refugees there. [...] He said the department was still waiting to hear back from ASIO on its re-assessment of its previous security assessment that led to two long-term detainees remaining on the island - one is now living in the community and the other currently in hospital in Australia. The department's spokesman said the cost of keeping the Nauru centre open was $33.7 million (2004-05 figure). From July to December last year when it was empty, the cost was $14.9 million.
Detainees put on secret flight to Nauru
Seven Burmese asylum seekers are today surrounded by a bleak landscape of coral pinnacles at Australia's detention centre on the remote Pacific Island nation of Nauru. Their flight yesterday from Christmas Island, kept secret for "security reasons", made them the vanguard of the "Pacific solution mark II" and the only inmates. [...] They were accompanied by 19 Australian personnel, including private security guards from the detention facility contractor Global Solutions Ltd.
Parliamentarians stand up for compassion
“We congratulate those MPs and Senators who stood up for compassion and human rights and opposed this bill. “Together with tens of thousands of people around the country who spoke out against this legislation we were able to prevent a serious injustice from being institutionalised. “A Just Australia sees the withdrawal of this legislation as consistent with the Parliament’s decision last year to move our immigration system in a more humane direction. Parliament has signalled today that it will not renege on this commitment it made to the Australian people.
PM pulls migration Bill
Prime Minister John Howard says the Government will not be proceeding with its controversial migration Bill. [...] "What has happened is that the Labor Party and a small number of coalition members and senators have together - not acting together, let me make that clear - but their views have virtually coincided, that combination means we would not secure passage of the legislation," he said.
Revolt forces Australia PM to ditch new asylum laws
Revolt forces Australia PM to ditch new asylum laws
Australian PM drops asylum bill
Australian prime minister drops tough refugee bill amid criticism
Howard under fire with immigration law
Australian Parliament blocks refugee bill
PM dumps asylum laws
Better frustrated than humiliated
But the damage might have been even greater if he had let this drama run all the way to its natural end. For the first time, Howard's own MPs - or a strategically-placed handful of them in both houses - would have stopped the Prime Minister from having his way in full view of the public.
Govt 'bullying' senators on migration Bill
"It's really against the law to threaten someone to influence their vote," [Senator Allison] said. With the numbers so tight, Senator Allison has accused the Government of bullying its own, in an attempt to get the Bill through. "I think there is a lot of untoward pressure on those who've said they don't support this bill and I actually think that is undemocratic," she said.
Troeth silent on migration vote decision
I have made up my mind but I'll be making it clear in the chamber tomorrow," she told reporters. "I think every senator has the right to reserve their decision, indeed every member of parliament, for a variety of reasons. "I've not said how I'm going to vote. That decision stands and I'll be making it clear tomorrow."
Migration Bill would put Papuan in exile, lawyer says
The lawyer for a Papuan asylum seeker now living in Melbourne says his client would be still in exile if the Federal Government's proposed migration laws were in place. David Wainggai was the only one of 43 Papuans who arrived in Cape York in January to be refused a visa, and spent five months alone on Christmas Island.
Senators lobbied ahead of migration Bill vote
Baptist social justice commentator Tim Costello urges senators to oppose the Bill. "The quicksand of politics is where you really lose your feet, the only solid ground is human rights and the refugee convention is a fundamental human rights convention," he said.
Fielding to oppose migration Bill in Senate
Family First Senator Steve Fielding has announced he will vote against the Federal Government's proposal to extend offshore processing for asylum seekers. [...] "Family First is opposing the changes because it will see Australia no longer playing by the rules and I think most people understand that," he said. "Most Australians will realise, well, there are rules and it would be absolute chaos if every other country did what Australia is proposing. It's ludicrous.
Migration Bill passes Lower House
Three Federal Government MPs have crossed the floor and another has abstained from voting as the controversial move to extend offshore processing for asylum seekers passed the House of Representatives. Petro Georgiou, Russell Broadbent and Judi Moylan sided with the Opposition and Bruce Baird abstained, but the Bill still passed.
The picture in the Senate is unclear, with key coalition Senators Judith Troeth and Barnaby Joyce yet to announce which way they will vote.
Dissident MPs line-up against migration Bill
The myth of Nauru asylum seekers 'voluntary return'
The Asylum Seeker Resource Centre (ASRC)has been told today by refugees held on Nauru, of the methods used by DIMA to get them to sign to return to the countries from which they had fled. Minister Vanstone states that the Afghan asylum seekers on Nauru returned voluntarily. “Former Nauru detainees have described how this voluntary process was applied,” says Pamela Curr, ASRC campaign coordinator. “One result of the four years in Nauru's camps is that even now, settled in Australia on Temporary visas there is a great fear of retribution from DIMA. One young refugee said -they say there is democracy in this country but I can not believe, I believe that they (DIMA) can catch me any time they want and take me.”
Decision about Afghan boy being reviewed
On July 30, a spokeswoman for the department said the boy had received the treatment he needed. "In line with long-standing government policy the minister has decided that the family will be moved to Christmas Island for offshore processing." But the department said it had not decided on the future of the boy and his parents. "A decision is yet to be made regarding their relocation," a department spokesman told AAP.
Backbenchers to cross floor on migration
All were willing to suffer the political consequences of challenging the majority view of their party, just one day after Prime Minister John Howard called for unity. "If I am to die politically because of my stance on this bill, it is better to die on my feet than to live on my knees," Mr Broadbent told parliament during an impassioned speech. Ms Moylan, whose preselection for her West Australian seat of Pearce is reportedly under threat as a direct result of her outspoken views, was equally firm in her resolve.
Liberals revolt on migration law
TWO Coalition backbenchers have announced they will cross the floor and vote with the Opposition against the Howard Government's changes to migrations law. Defying a plea from John Howard to abstain rather than voting with Labor, Victorians Petro Georgiou and Russell Broadbent told the House of Representatives the bill was unfair.
Both men had been involved in negotiating changes to the migration laws last year which took families out of detention centres and bolstered legal representation. But they said the latest changes, that would see the asylum claims by unauthorised arrivals processed offshore by the United Nations would make the 2005 deal redundant.
Two Liberals to cross floor on immigration
MARK COLVIN: The Prime Minister may have to wait till tomorrow before he finds out how successful he's been in containing a backbench revolt in the lower house over his controversial new immigration law. And even then, he'll still be in suspense about whether he can get it through the Senate. So far today, two Liberal MPs say they're still intending to cross the floor and vote against the Government.
More 'hush and rush' on asylum seekers
HOW can you realistically protect a child from the evil and damage of
immigration detention as we have known it? How can the deprivation of individual
liberty and the innocence and freedom of childhood ever be justified?
If John Howard wants to look tough and in control, let him lead our troops in
Afghanistan or Iraq, not manipulate his MPs into passing legislation that will
enable further breaches of human rights and mistreatment of innocent people
while in the care of the Australian Government, no matter which contractors are
paid to do the dirty work.
Frederika Steen, Chapel Hill, Qld
Australia debates asylum changes
Ruling party member Petro Georgiou told reporters that the bill was "the most profoundly disturbing piece of legislation I have encountered since becoming a member of parliament". He told the Associated Press that parliament was now being asked to take a "severely regressive measure". But the opposition of a few ruling party members is unlikely to prevent the bill from passing in the lower chamber, because Mr Howard has a comfortable majority.
Australian government introduces tough refugee bill to Parliament
While it is not clear whether the dissent within the center-right government's ranks would be enough to defeat the legislation, it creates a destabilizing rift as Prime Minister John Howard seeks re-election to a fifth three-year term next year.
Howard faces anger over tough refugee Bill
PM tries to stop migration law showdown
Prime Minister John Howard has urged dissenting backbenchers to abstain from voting on tough new immigration laws rather than cross the floor of parliament. During a heated joint parties meeting, Mr Howard ruled out making any more changes to the laws, which would send all boat people to island detention centres for processing. At least four backbenchers told the meeting they could not support the draft laws, party room sources said. The legislation is due to be debated in the House of Representatives this week.
Deported asylum seekers killed
'[Abdul's] house was bombed and his children were killed after he was returned to Afghanistan’, Mr Glendenning said. ‘He told officials this would happen and it did. Both his children are now dead.Any public policy that has as its end result the death of innocent people, and especially children, is a policy that no civilised nation can possibly consider. The so-called Pacific solution is no solution at all. The Edmund Rice Centre urges all MP’s and Senators to reject proposals to reinstitute off-shore processing of asylum seekers. In our experience in 18 countries there is too much evidence that we are getting it wrong. And on this issue if you get it wrong – people get killed.’ Mr Glendenning concluded.
RCOA calls for an independent inquiry into deaths of returned asylum seekers
Rejected refugees sent home to die: families tell harrowing stories
In one harrowing account, a Hazara Afghan deported after 16 months on Christmas Island and Nauru - despite his pleas that he and his family would be killed - lost his two children, aged six and nine. A grenade was dropped on their house four months after they returned to Afghanistan. "My children died so that John Howard could win an election," Abdul is quoted as telling the Edmund Rice Centre, which has spent the past three years interviewing more than 80 rejected asylum seekers in 18 countries. It has released its findings to coincide with the Government's migration bill, which has divided the Coalition.
Deported Afghans 'tortured and killed'
All of the asylum-seekers were held on the Pacific Island of Nauru under the government policy of sending boatpeople who do not make it to the mainland to overseas processing centres. The Howard Government now wants to toughen the policy to send all boatpeople, even those who make it to the mainland, to overseas centres. But the head of the ERF's inquiry, Phil Glendenning, said yesterday the probe raised serious questions about offshore detainees' access to legal assistance, advocacy and avenues of appeal. MPs will vote today on the tough new policy.
Vanstone 'incorrectly informed' on Afghan deaths
The Edmund Rice Centre (ERC) has rejected an assertion made by the Immigration Minister that her department has been unable to follow-up claims that up to nine asylum seekers were killed after being deported to Afghanistan. The Catholic human rights group says it investigated the fate of almost 200 failed Afghan asylum seekers who were detained on the Pacific Island of Nauru while their applications were processed in 2002. Senator Amanda Vanstone says the centre has made similar claims before, but never in enough detail for her department to investigate. ERC's Phil Glendenning says all relevant information has been passed onto the Minister's department.
Child refugees denied basic rights - study
RIZ WAKIL fled Afghanistan at the age of 18, after his family had become a political target and his brother was kidnapped. [...] Mr Wakil spent nine months in Western Australia's Curtin detention centre before receiving a temporary protection visa in 2000. Now aged 24 and an Australian resident, Mr Wakil has helped tell the stories of many young people like him, who arrived in Australia to seek asylum unaccompanied by an adult. Their plight is captured in a study, Seeking Asylum Alone, by Mary Crock, an associate professor of law at the University of Sydney. The report shows Australia has denied child refugees basic rights, including a right to be heard. She has called on the Federal Government to ensure children who arrive in Australia unaccompanied are told of their right to claim asylum and given help to express their case.
System 'victimises' child asylum seekers
"In spite of Australia's claimed embrace of the principles of child protection, its immigration practices mark unaccompanied and separated children as marginalised to the point of victimisation. "The normal exclusion of children as a voiceless group of citizens is exaggerated in the case of the population studied in this report by two aggravating circumstances – their non-citizen status, and their lack of access to parental or other protective adult involvement."
Prof Crock said in most respects Australian laws governing refugee protection were characterised most starkly by a failure to make any distinctions at all between child and adult. The report found 290 of the 4,089 children who entered Australia between 1999 and 2003 without valid visas arrived alone, including some as young as eight-years-old.
Until July 2005, they were all routinely placed in immigration detention.
Asylum seeker health 'neglected'
AN asylum seeker's attempted suicide at Baxter detention centre is further evidence their mental health is being neglected, the Australian Greens said today. And it was a message to MPs deciding their position on the Government's controversial border protection legislation. A 30-year-old asylum seeker from central Africa, who had been in detention for almost two years, tried to hang himself at Baxter, near Port Augusta, in South Australia, yesterday, the Greens said. He was one of six detainees taken to Glenside psychiatric hospital for treatment but was returned to Baxter about four months ago, against the advice of doctors, said Greens refugee spokesman Peter Job.
"They were returned against their will, and against the will of their treating doctors, who said returning them to detention would be a very dangerous thing to do," Mr Job said.
Young, alone and legally abandoned
THEY were smuggled out in the dead of night in the backs of trucks under hay or bags of flour. They were children from Afghanistan whose relatives were desperate to save them from the fate of older brothers or fathers, killed or kidnapped by the Taliban. Most of the children had no say in the decision, did not know where they were going, and had never heard of Australia. And when these children - unaccompanied minors - arrived after traumatic boat journeys, Australia treated them as if they were adults, or in the care of adults, throwing them into detention centres, giving them no special help, or support. Among asylum seekers, the children travelling alone were the most vulnerable group. But despite our professed love of children, Australia did not even notice them - not in official policy, at least. They were not assigned guardians or lawyers or told of their rights. Last year the law was changed so that children could no longer be put in detention except as a matter of last resort. It was a tiny step forward. Now the Government is set on reversing even this measure.
Refugee advocate says detention a waste of money
David Wainggai was recognised as a refugee by the Refugee Review Tribunal on Monday, after he was initially refused a protection visa by the Immigration Department. The Tribunal concluded that David Wainggai does in fact satisfy the criteria for a protection visa. [....]
KAY BERNARD: I don't think there's anybody in Australia that realises that the cost of the offshore detention policy has been over half-a-million dollars for one man, when he could have been accommodated on the mainland, here in Australia while his matter was being processed, for $190 dollars a day.
Nauru officials visit Baxter detention centre
The small island country is now looking to make its processing camps for asylum seekers more comfortable for families, and it is using Baxter as an example. Nauru's Foreign Minister David Adeang will tour the Baxter Residential Housing Project in Port Augusta today and hold various meetings with Australian Government officials. Asylum Seeker Resource Centre spokeswoman Pamela Curr says Australia should be careful with the advice it gives. "There are many areas where Australia could offer leadership but the detention of human beings is not one of them," she said.
The human face of the Pacific Solution
As the debate continued over legislation to toughen the policy by processing all future boat arrivals on Nauru, Ms Sedaqatyar's father, Kasim Moheebee, wept as he pleaded his daughter's case. More than seven years of separation was too much, he said.
PM forced to wait on asylum seeker laws
When he announced the immigration concessions, Mr Howard said he would wait six weeks before introducing the redrafted bill to parliament. [...] Under the concessions, women, children and families will be housed in offshore residential-style accommodation in a community setting after initial processing, upholding an agreement made in parliament last year that women and children not be held in detention centres.
Debate on asylum laws delayed until next parliamentary session
The two major sticking points from the backbench group are that the bill still doesn't give people found to be legitimate refugees access to Australia, nor does it guarantee asylum-seekers sent to Nauru would have recourse to Australia's legal system. But the Prime Minister says most of his MPs think he's gone as far as he should to meet the backbench concerns.
JOHN HOWARD: We have made very big changes, but they don't affect the main thrust of the legislation. In these matters the minority viewpoint has a right to be heard, but in the end a majority view clearly expressed is the way our party has always operated.
Tampa won us votes: Libs
During the acrimonious Coalition party meeting - coincidentally on World Refugee Day - Coalition MPs in marginal seats accused "small-l" Liberal MPs of undermining the Coalition's prospects at the next election. Described by those attending as "really nasty", the meeting heard the NSW MPs Bob Baldwin, Alby Schultz and Ian Causley demand the rebel Liberals accept the majority view in the Government on asylum seekers.
Migration bill stand-off tipped to drag on
One of the MPs seeking changes to the proposal, Bruce Baird, says he is not sure the issue will be settled by Friday, when Parliament rises for a six-week winter break. [...] The Human Rights Commissioner Graeme Innes has called for the migration bill to be delayed, saying it would make a positive statement for Australia on World Refugee Day. [...] Mr Innes says, even with concessions, there are major problems with offshore detention. "This bill puts children back in detention, there's no time limits on detention, so there's a real risk for the mental health and wellbeing of children and adults in detention," he said. "There's no review of decisions made about refugee status and in the last financial year the Department of Immigration got one out of three wrong."
Immigration laws may create 'Guantanamo'
"Offshore detention facilities would remove basic legal protections provided under Australia's legal system, including access to legal advice, independent reviews and appeals to courts and tribunals," Mr North said. "These are the hallmarks of Guantanamo Bay.
Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission calls on government to ensure protection of asylum seekers on World Refugee Day
“It is a testament to the quality of Australia’s refugee protection groups that the Senate Committee was so powerfully persuaded by the human rights arguments relating to the legislation. I commend the large number of refugee organisations in Australia who have worked to focus the Federal Government’s attention on the rights of asylum seekers. I am sure they, as well as the Commission, would be dismayed to see this legislation pass on a day that is supposed to recognise the plight of refugees worldwide.” “Passing the Bill in its current form would mark a backward step in Australia’s treatment of asylum seekers,” said Mr Innes. “The Bill will result in a breach of Australia’s obligations under the Convention on the Rights of the Child and undermine Australia’s obligations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.”
Rebel MPS still against Bill
THE Federal Government had so far done nothing to allay backbench concerns over its controversial asylum-seeker legislation, Liberal senator Judith Troeth said today. Senator Troeth is one of a number of Coalition MPS unhappy with proposed changes to immigration law, under which all asylum-seekers arriving by boat would be processed offshore. "Positions are being put and positions are being digested by both sides, and that is where we are up to," she said. A Government-dominated parliamentary committee has recommended that the Bill be shelved and some 10 Coalition MPs and senators have said they will reject it.
Vanstone flags concessions over migration bill impasse
The Federal Immigration Minister will again meet a group of rebel Coalition backbenchers today, in a bid to break the impasse over the Government's migration bill. Minister Amanda Vanstone has flagged possible concessions.
Process asylum seekers in Australia: PNG
Papua New Guinea Prime Minister Michael Somare says Australia should process asylum seekers on Australian soil and hinted that he may not allow PNG's Manus island to be used again as a detention centre. [...] "When they go to Australian soil, it's Australia's responsibility to deal with them, we don't set up places where we process refugees who come to our country," Somare told reporters.
Talks to avert asylum split
THE Government has again postponed voting on a controversial asylum-seeker bill and will continue negotiations with dissenting backbenchers over the weekend to avoid a split on the floor of parliament. [...] Nationals senator Barnaby Joyce and Family First senator Steve Fielding - who both have reservations about the bill - confirmed that they had not been approached by the Government for their support, indicating the Coalition remains confident of winning the dissidents' backing. But a source told The Australian last night that although the meetings were "constructive", John Howard's desire for the Migration Amendments Bill to be finalised before the seven-week winter break was unlikely to be realised. "The Prime Minister was hopeful for that - he expressed a strong preference to have this matter resolved in this sitting - but it seems to my mind that that may be a little more difficult," the source said.
Author Earls urges empathy with refugees
"We need to move beyond the statistics and headlines, and actually connect with the people and see what they have gone through," Mr Earls said. "If you try to put yourself in their shoes you realise that the humanity at the heart of these things is the most important thing." [...] Queensland's Multicultural Affairs Minister Chris Cummins supported Mr Earls' comments, saying the federal government's immigration policies were damaging Australia's image overseas. "Locking children up is not good policy," Mr Cummins said. "We need to protect our borders but not at the expense of innocent children."
Govt seeks to quell backbench revolt over migration bill
ELEANOR HALL: The Government has delayed debate on its controversial Migration Bill, as it tries to deal with a backbench revolt that could scuttle the bill. In the most serious division the Howard Government has faced since it won office a decade ago, 10 Coalition members and Senators are now opposing the Bill, which would force all asylum seekers who arrive by boat to be processed offshore. The Immigration Minister, Amanda Vanstone is now making conciliatory noises and says she is looking very closely at the highly critical Senate committee report into the legislation.
Senators review migration Bill
Senator Fielding's vote could be crucial if the Government cannot win over rebel coalition senators who have raised concerns about the Bill. [...] Senator Fielding today said he was concerned about the offshore processing of asylum seekers but was yet to decide whether to back the changes. "I am concerned also about the time it takes ... having people in detention for two, three, four, five, six, seven years is just a joke," he said.
Asylum rebels 'should work with colleagues'
Mr Thompson said he was not surprised by the rebel group but they should keep in mind that they do not hold the view of the majority of the party. "I'm not surprised by it but it's absolutely essential that the Coalition members remember the majority view of the party room that has been expressed many times now," he said.
Immigration laws 'may be changed'
Senator Vanstone spent several hours with the backbenchers today and hinted that a compromise could be found. But the Government still plans to force a debate on the draft laws in Parliament tomorrow, despite a government dominated Senate committee recommending they be scrapped. The legislation would send all unauthorised boat arrivals offshore to countries like Nauru for processing, rather than allow them to enter Australia. That would lead to women and children being held in detention centres – reversing one of the changes won by backbenchers including moderate Liberals Judi Moylan, Petro Georgiou and Bruce Baird last year.
Offshore asylum laws in doubt as back bench rebels
A government-dominated Senate committee yesterday took the rare step of recommending the legislation be scrapped and backbenchers are threatening to vote against it in Parliament unless it is modified. The Government faces the prospect of an embarrassing defeat for its legislation in the Senate unless it negotiates changes with Government backbenchers.
Politicians cross party lines to oppose detention
AN ALL-PARTY Senate committee has urged the Howard Government to ditch its tough new laws on asylum seekers after being told they are unworkable, in breach of Australia's international obligations and an "inappropriate response" to pressure from Indonesia. The scathing report will strengthen the resolve of several Government MPs who are prepared to cross the floor to defeat the laws, which Prime Minister John Howard wants passed before Parliament breaks for the winter recess next week.
Push to scuttle asylum laws strengthens
Four Coalition senators are believed to have major concerns about the Government's proposed changes to the migration law. This is three more than would be needed to scuttle the bill if, as expected, senators from Labor and the minor parties vote against it. "It looks like there is a majority in the Senate to make the case for change," Mr Joyce said. But Prime Minister John Howard yesterday was unmoved by the dissent, saying the bill would go ahead "and I believe it will pass".
Immigration lawyer welcomes drug, assault claims probe
A prominent immigration lawyer says she is relieved an investigation is under way into complaints of drug use and sexual assault at Sydney's Villawood detention centre. [...] She says she has also complained to Immigration officials about women being sexually assaulted by male detainees, because they could not lock the doors to their rooms. "Nothing had been done about that and I still believe it's the same situation today," she said. "Fortunately the children aren't in there any more, but yes my client was abused over a period of six months in front of her child."
Nauru child detainees 'sent home'
More than half of the unaccompanied children sent to Nauru under the Pacific Solution returned to Afghanistan, raising fresh concerns about the fairness of offshore processing. [...] Of the 55 children registered as unaccompanied when they were sent to Nauru under the controversial Pacific Solution, 32 later returned to Afghanistan, in 2002-03. [...] But none of the 290 children travelling without an adult whose claims were processed in Australia in the same period were sent back to the war-torn south Asian nation. [...] "Children need assistance if they are going to make out the case that they are refugees," Dr Crock said after appearing before the Senate committee.
Thousands petition against asylum changes
A petition against the Federal Government's plan to process offshore all asylum seekers arriving by boat has been presented to a Senate inquiry. The petition, which has 30,000 signatures, has been presented by refugee rights group A Just Australia at the committee hearing in Sydney today. [...] A Just Australia national coordinator Kate Gauthier says the law is inhuman, especially the renewed detention of children places such as Nauru. "It's a completely ridiculous argument that because kids are let out during the day, they're not actually in detention," she said.
Papuan's visa decision faces reversal
Mr Manne said the expiration of Mr Wainggai's visa [in September] would have a significant effect on future decisions about the case. "It would evaporate the Government's already baseless argument that he would be allowed into Japan," Mr Manne said. "The Government's denial of protection would have gone from baseless to bizarre."
Nauru detention fear for Afghan asylum seekers
Refugee advocates say the two adults and child may be sent to the offshore immigration detention centre at Nauru and are being denied legal and community contact. The boy recently spent several days in the Royal Children's Hospital in Brisbane, where he was treated for a serious illness.
9 year old Afghan boy and parents held incommunicado in Brisbane
ChilOut is absolutely outraged that an extremely sick nine year old boy from Afghanistan and his parents have been held incommunicado in Brisbane since 24 May. The boy was in a Brisbane children's hospital until last Monday when he was discharged pending surgery in two weeks' time. ChilOut believes that he and his parents are now being held under guard in a Brisbane motel. [...] ChilOut spokesperson Dianne Hiles said today, "this extremely vulnerable family have not had access to legal advice, which means they are in incommunicado, or in 'separation' detention. They have been denied access to visitors from either the local Afghan community, Amnesty International or the Red Cross. The only contact the family has with the outside world is guards who work for GSL (the private prison company contracted to run detention centres). Those guards do not speak any of the languages of Afghanistan and are explicitly instructed not to help the family access a migration agent or lawyer.
Australia must not slam the door shut on children
The Government is trying to change refugee policy to force all asylum seekers arriving by boat out of Australian territory and into detention centres in Nauru and Papua New Guinea. ChilOut is opposed to this outrageous proposal as it would mean children back in detention again, with no Ministerial discretion to house families in community detention in Australian cities, as is the case today. [...] "When a child asks for our protection, should we slam the door and send her away? If Parliament lets the Prime Minister get away with this, Australia will be breaking international law, which requires that we allow anyone to seek asylum here who asks. Australia can't pick and choose those we allow to ask for our help," Ms Hiles said.
Refugee group queries family handling
A nine-year-old boy who arrived on a Torres Strait island with his mother and father has fallen ill and been transferred to the Australian mainland for treatment. [....] They told immigration officials they were from Afghanistan, but have yet to be formally interviewed. The officials have said they may return the family to PNG where it is understood they departed. But Kate Gauthier, from A Just Australia, said the government would be in breach of international law and human rights principles if it attempted to remove the family before any effort was made to ascertain whether they were refugees. She said anything less than a thorough and fair assessment of their asylum claim on the Australian mainland could mean putting the child's life at risk.
Immigration defends offshore processing
"Offshore processing centres are not detention centres and conditions of movement are determined by the respective governments of Nauru and Papua New Guinea," [Immigration Department's deputy secretary Bob Correll] said. "The arrangements will ensure that all designated unauthorised arrivals will have access to an effective refugee determination process." [...] The Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commissioner Graeme Innes told the committee he is concerned about children. "Under the proposed changes, children will be detained as a measure of first resort, not last resort," he said.
The Vanstone wiggle
"I am satisfied that the applicant has a well-founded fear of persecution on account of an imputed political opinion ... should the applicant be returned to Papua." This was the finding of an official from Vanstone's department in the case of David Wainggai, the last of the 43 Papuans who arrived in Australia by canoe in January to have his application for asylum determined. Wainggai is related to some of the 42 and is the son of a former leader of the West Papuan independence movement, Thomas Wainggai, who was jailed in 1988 and died in prison in 1996. He had just as strong a case for asylum as the others but after leaving him waiting on Christmas Island for four months, Vanstone announced that his application had been rejected. Indonesia will be pleased. The reason for the rejection? His mother is Japanese (although she does not live there and has renounced her Japanese citizenship) and he may be able to live in Japan. How many refugees has Japan taken over the past year? None, according to the written departmental decision on Wainggai, which also quoted from a report on Japan saying that "concerns have been raised that potential refugees are being deported without proper consideration of their cases".
Call for Vanstone to allow Leongs to stay in Australia
Exactly a year ago, a mother and her three year old daughter walked free from Sydney's Villawood Detention Centre. For the child, Naomi Leong, it was her first real taste of freedom. Naomi was born inside the Immigration Department facility. Her psychiatrist had been expressing grave concerns about what detention seemed to be doing to the little girl's mental health. She had become withdrawn and mute and was banging her head against the wall. Virginia Leong and her daughter were released on bridging protection visas by the Immigration Department, but they've been in limbo ever since, awaiting their fate. Now there are calls for the Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone to intervene and allow them to remain in Australia on compassionate grounds.
Offshore processing standards worry UNHCR
[UNHCR] says if this new system does not meet the same high standards as processing within Australia, then it could effectively discriminate against those arriving by boat. "We would like to see the same standards for offshore processing that exist in Australia," Jennifer Pagonis, spokeswoman of the UNHCR, said. "If you are being processed in Australia, you have access to legal representation. "We don't know the full details of what is going to be [the situation] on Nauru."
Migration bill 'undermines human rights'
The [Human Rights and Equal Opportunity] commission's president, John von Doussa QC, and Human Rights Commissioner Graeme Innes on Friday released a statement criticising the government's plan to expand its "Pacific solution" by allowing offshore processing for all asylum seekers who arrive by boat. "The practical effect of the present bill is that children, once again, will be detained in conditions which endanger their well-being and mental health," the statement says. "Being held in an offshore processing centre is, without doubt, a form of detention."
Migration Act changes threaten the human rights of asylum seekers
The Convention on the Rights of the Child provides that detention of children must be a last resort and for the shortest possible period of time. Under the proposed changes detention of children will be a measure of first resort, not last resort. These concerns are not new. The Commission’s two-year National Inquiry into Children in Immigration Detention, A last resort? (published in April 2004), warned that the 2001 “Pacific Solution” breached several of Australia’s human rights obligations and recommended a review of the impact on children of the legislation that created the “Pacific Solution”. This recommendation was not implemented. The proposed changes do not address the possibility of excessive or indefinite detention. There is no set time for offshore processing of claims for asylum and no set time in which a person who is determined to be a refugee must be resettled in a third country.
Rights groups slam govt over Papuans
A group of 47 rights organisations, including Human Rights Watch and the International Immigrants' Foundation, wrote to Prime Minister John Howard protesting that the new laws contravene an important refugee convention to which Australia is a signatory. "We, the undersigned organisations, protest in the strongest terms possible your government's announced plan to seek national legislation extending the 'Pacific Solution' to anyone intercepted attempting to enter Australia by boat without a visa," the letter said. "As described by officials of your government, many of the plan's components we believe are in violation of the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, to which Australia is a party."
Proposed migration laws 'unforgivable'
"Never before in Australia's history has a government wanted to pretend that we have no border," Mr Burke [Labor;s immigration spokesman] said."This is bad legislation where the principle of it is wrong and the motivation for it is unforgivable."
Iraqi family of six held under guard pending deportation
The Iraqi children — three girls aged two, 10 and 13 and a boy of 11 — and their parents have been held at the Immigration Department's Port Augusta housing centre for the last two months. A department spokesman said yesterday: "It is still a place of detention." They are under 24-hour guard, he said. Alanna Sherry, spokeswoman for ChilOut, a group campaigning to keep children out of detention, said it was a breach of Mr Howard's undertaking last year to backbenchers that children would not be locked up.
Coalition MPs question offshore asylum seeker processing
The Government's moves to change the Migration Act have been given added urgency with the interception of three more asylum seekers from the Indonesian province of Papua. [...] The Government wants to ensure that all such arrivals will be processed in offshore detention centres and will introduce amendments this week. The issue was hotly debated in a joint party meeting this morning, with at least five MPs indicating their unwillingness to support the bill. The Prime Minister says he is prepared to discuss the MPs' concerns but he will not withdraw the bill or make any large changes.
Deporting Papuans 'likely to be a struggle'
The three men initially landed in Papua New Guinea. Senator Vanstone says the Government will try to send them back there.
But Democrats Senator Andrew Bartlett says that is unlikely. "I think Papua New Guinea quite rightly believes it's about time Australia pulled its weight in this area given the thousands of refugees that they've taken from West Papua," Senator Bartlett said.
Process Papuans in Australia: Greens
Senator Nettle said the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, Amnesty International and the Greens had all condemned further changes proposed to immigration laws. These include the excision of parts of Australia's coastline and are still being debated in the coalition party room. "Asylum seekers from West Papua will continue (to come to Australia) as long as human rights abuses and economic and environmental injustices are allowed to continue in West Papua," she said.
More West Papuans found on way to Australia
The Federal Government has revealed today that three men from Indonesia's Papua province were found in the Torres Strait on Saturday by Immigration officials. [...] Senator Vanstone says because they arrived on an excised island, they will not be processed in Australia if they seek asylum, and are not entitled to apply for refugee status under Australia's Migration Act.
National TV ads protest proposed detention laws
Last year the Government struck a deal to release children held in immigration centres into the community. However, the Government has now proposed changes to immigration laws that will see asylum seekers who make it to mainland Australia transported offshore to be processed for assessment. [...] Petro Georgiou says he and other backbenchers are waiting to see a draft of the new laws before commenting. Family First Senator Steve Fielding and Nationals Senator Barnaby Joyce also say they are waiting to see what impact the proposed laws will have on family and children.
TV ads to protest immigration policy
Refugee groups will release a television commercial protesting against the government's changes to its immigration policy.
A Just Australia, Chillout and GetUp.org.au, produced the advertisement which protests against the government's new hardline immigration laws, which they say could result in children again being locked up in detention centres.
[...] "The minister is still peddling the despicable and divisive myth that only people handpicked by the government are genuine refugees and uses the dishonest, inflammatory term 'illegal boat arrivals' to attack other refugees, when she knows full well seeking asylum is not illegal." [Senator Andrew
Mike Steketee: Howard is wrong on refugees
The Government will accept its obligations under the Refugee Convention to process these cases in only the most grudging way. For fear of offending Indonesia, it will scour the world to try to find other countries to accept refugees. The rest of the world rightly will say that, with Papua on our doorstep, they are our responsibility. If other countries adopted Australia's attitude, the Refugee Convention would collapse. [...] The decision betrays Petro Georgiou and his fellow band of Liberal dissidents who extracted last year's concessions from Howard. It leaves Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone high and dry. Only four weeks ago, she was stressing the decisions on the 42 Papuans were based on their individual circumstances, not the feelings of the Indonesian Government or anyone else.
Abandoning West Papua
The laws make a mockery of the recent improvements in the treatment of detainees supposedly undertaken by Vanstone, and they turn the clock back to a time which most Australians believed we had finally left behind. It is evident from the Minister’s announcement that we will even see a return to children in detention. Whether they are let out during the day is not really the point.
Detention plans stir rebel Liberals
THE prospect of children returning to detention under the Howard Government's tough new rules for dealing with boatpeople threatens to rekindle a rebellion among Coalition MPs. The Government's decision to force all illegal arrivals, including children, who reach mainland Australia by boat into offshore immigration detention centres could sideline reforms introduced in June in response to a backbench revolt led by Liberal MP Petro Georgiou.
Lib MPs rebel over hard line on asylum
LIBERAL backbenchers will confront the Prime Minister over asylum seekers, angered that he has betrayed them and overturned a fairer deal for boat people in an attempt to appease Indonesia. Ten months after John Howard agreed to a "softer edge" to the handling of asylum claims, moderate MPs fear children will again be exposed to the horrors of detention - this time on Pacific islands rather than in Australia.
New Pacific solution targets Papuans
The Howard government has toughened its asylum regime in a clear message to Papuans that they will be shipped anywhere but Australia if they try to find protection.
West Papuans receive TPVs...
West Papuan refugees prepare to settle in Melbourne
Now that they've been granted Temporary Protection Visas here, the 42 asylum seekers are preparing to settle in Melbourne. The group, mainly made of up activists who want an independent nation of West Papua, arrived at Cape York in January. They were taken to Christmas Island, where most were held at the detention centre, and some were allowed to live in the community. Some of the group have been in Perth for health checks, and David Weber went to see them.
Indonesia MP slams West Papua visas
Jakarta had been calling for the boatload of asylum seekers to be sent back to Indonesia but Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone today announced 42 of the 43 Papuans who landed at Cape York in January have received temporary protection visas (TPV). They would be relocated from Christmas Island to Melbourne, Senator Vanstone said.
Ombudsman damns immigration detention of mentally ill man
The Commonwealth Ombudsman has released a damning report into the unlawful detention of a severely mentally ill man who was mistaken for an illegal immigrant. The 45-year-old man originally from Vietnam, known only as "Mr T", was detained in the Villawood detention centre in Sydney three times over four years. On one occasion he was held for eight months. [...] The Immigration Department says there could be another 27 cases of people being unlawfully detained.
US targets Australia in rights review
The federal government's industrial relations overhaul, the Cronulla race riots and the detention of asylum seekers have been singled out by the US State Department in its latest human rights review. [...] The department also highlights the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (HREOC) 2004 report on children in immigration detention. That report found Australia's laws allowing child asylum seekers to be held in mandatory immigration detention breached the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, to which Australia is a party. The HREOC report's findings were largely rejected by the Howard government.
Read ChilOut Media release on Shayan's out-of-court settlement...
Immigration hit by day of backdowns
A day of turmoil in the nation's immigration system ended with the Federal Government backing down on several fronts yesterday. It agreed to pay damages to a boy traumatised in detention and allowed a deported Melbourne man to return to Australia on humanitarian grounds. In Sydney, an 11-year-old Iranian, Shayan Badraie, was offered damages for trauma he suffered in Woomera and Villawood detention centres. The move comes after a 63-day Supreme Court hearing. While in detention between March 2000 and August 2001, the boy became severely traumatised after witnessing riots, a stabbing and a string of other disturbing incidents. He subsequently spent 94 days in hospital, and still requires treatment.
Boy, 11, wins payout over detention trauma
The settlement followed a crucial piece of testimony. The Immigration Department's former head of border control and detention, Philippa Godwin, directly contradicted her department's previously stated position that detention did not cause mental illness. "We agreed that people in detention could have psychological difficulties and that detention may contribute to these or even be the source of them ... it may be a cause of difficulties for some children," she said. [...] His family, who now live in western Sydney, also received news yesterday that they had been granted a permanent protection visa to stay in Australia.
Immigration Dept settles Badraie case
His lawyer, Rebecca Gilsenan, says the settlement and the granting of permanent residency to her client's family this week should help his recovery. "The grant of the visa and the resolution of this case will allow this family to settle permanently and to have some certainty and to be able to try and look after their child and address the illness that he developed because of the way he was treated in immigration detention," she said.
Detention centre 'deceptive' on inmate services
Reading from an October 2000 list of activities supplied to the Government by ACM, Shayan's lawyer, Andrew Morrison SC, asked Mr Clifton if they had actually taken place. "A children's party -- 17 detainees for an hour ... do you recall a party being held for any children?" Dr Morrison asked. "No," Mr Clifton replied. "Do you recall -- a little further down -- a school picnic being held?" "No." Other activities, including sport and a total of 3240 hours of child education claimed by AMC, did not take place, Mr Clifton said.
Boy may never get over fears: doctor
Suffering from post-traumatic stress syndrome, the Iranian-born child's intellectual and psychological development is so severely impaired, after witnessing several violent events at Woomera and Villawood, that he may never fully recover, Dr David Dossetor told the court. "Fourteen months at the age of six in a detention centre is a large proportion of his life. Five years out of 10 years with severe symptomatology from PTSD has a huge impact for his prognosis. Even if he got over his anxiety he would have an increased risk of subsequent psychiatric disorder for depression and anxiety-related disorders.
Papuans tell of torture
A senior immigration source said the 43 asylum seekers, who arrived by boat in Australia 12 days ago, had a "very strong case" to be granted refugee status, possibly within weeks. "Some of what has come out of the interviews has been absolutely heart-wrenching," the source said. The testimony includes vicious bashings while in prison and attacks on villages and livestock in retaliation for the Papuans' agitating for independence.
Kids dumped under guard offshore: Giant leap backwards for Prime Minister
"At the moment all the asylum seeker children are held under guard and isolated as a direct result of a sharp degree of inflexiblity by the Govenrment, reminiscent of the days before a 3 year old born in detention named Naomi Leong coupled with the Vivian Alvarez and Cornelia Rau tragedies that blew open the problems with the implementation of a bad set of Immigration laws." said Mrs Bernard
West Papua: Asylum Seekers Move to Christmas Island Deplorable
[Rob Wesley Smith, the Darwin spokesman for "Australians for a Free West Papua"] says "It's quite shocking really that people who've come to Australia for political asylum and it's quite clear from the sign on their boat and so on and what we know about them, that they then get sent on a seven-hour Hercules flight almost to the door of Jakarta - get them as far away from people who might help them in Australia," he said. [...] "There is plenty of accommodation in Australia, in fact there is empty accommodation in Darwin and we offered to accommodate them anyway and to send them out to Christmas Island is a farce."
Jakarta warns asylum case endangers ties with Canberra
"The men in the group will be accommodated at the Phosphate Hill Detention Center, while the women and children will be placed in staff housing," [DIMIA] spokeswoman Sandi Longan was quoted by AFP as saying. Australian human rights groups and the opposition Labor Party criticized the decision to move the asylum seekers to Christmas Island rather than processing their asylum claim on the mainland. "I don't understand when there's excess capacity at mainland detention centers, why there's a need to take these asylum seekers as far away as possible from the best legal teams," said Tony Burke, immigration spokesman for the Labor Party.
Still locked up, long after winning freedom
AUSTRALIA'S longest-serving immigration detainee is still in Villawood detention centre, almost four months after he won all legal appeals against the Government's refusal to give him a visa because of war crimes allegations. [...] My belief has changed about human rights in this country," he said. "I can't see any sign of human rights. The Government knows I have a family of three young children and an ill wife who cannot work properly … [but] it still shamelessly keeps me in this detention centre." Mr Noori's wife, Karima, and his three children are Australian citizens living near Villawood. His son turns 15 today, but Mr Noori cannot even visit the family's modest unit to celebrate.
Another four Afghans given refugee status
FOUR more Afghans who have spent nearly four years on Nauru have been found to be refugees and will soon be resettled in Australia.But supporters are concerned about the emotional state of those who remain in the offshore processing centre, particularly an Iraqi man whose mother was recently killed in a car bomb blast in Iraq. [...] There are now 32 asylum seekers at the camp: 11 Afghans, 16 Iraqis, two Iranians, two Bangladeshis and a Pakistani.
Released immigration detainees experience life on the outside
ELEANOR HALL: The gates of Australia's immigration detention centres opened briefly two weeks ago for a mass release of 42 children and their families into the community.
It was part of a deal struck between the Prime Minister and several Liberal Party backbenchers to ensure that children seeking asylum are not placed under undue stress and trauma while their families' cases are being processed.
So how is community detention working for those now on the outside?
Karen Barlow went to Sydney's western suburbs to check on the progress of one family.
Baxter's changing role
TEN New Zealanders and four citizens of the United States and United Kingdom are being held in Baxter Detention Centre. [...] Australian Council for Civil Liberties spokesman David Bernie said it was an abuse of the purpose that Baxter was set up for. "If it's someone with ties to the community, why is there a need for detention at all?" he said. "With all these detention centres being set up around Australia and privately staffed, there's almost a detention centre industry and a need to fill them to keep them going. "Holding people in detention is the same as sending them to jail – it should be the last resort."
New look for Villawood as razor wire gets the snip
The razor wire around much of Sydney's Villawood detention centre will be removed in the next few weeks and landscaping will begin around the existing perimeter fence. [...]
She hailed the move as an example of the Government's softer approach since the scathing report of the Palmer inquiry into immigration detention. "This is a statement of good faith … building on steps already taken to remove all children from detention centres and providing a more hospitable environment for people located in such facilities, as well as their visitors," Senator Vanstone said.
Still stained by inhumane detention
It is hard to believe. Finally there are no children left behind razor wire. Perhaps a dark era in our treatment of children is coming to an end. If so, the question remains, how was it possible that we, as a nation, allowed children to be jailed? And how many Australians are aware of the trauma we have inflicted on children during the period of the Howard Government.
Detainees released from Christmas Island
The last 11 detainees remaining on Christmas Island have arrived in Perth and have been granted temporary protection visas. The three children and eight adults arrived at Perth's international airport late yesterday afternoon, tasting freedom for the first time in two years since they landed at Port Hedland by boat in 2003. Temporary protection visas have now been granted to all of the 52 people who were aboard the boat.
Detention centre contractor guilty of abuse
The company contracted to run immigration detention centres has been issued with penalties of more than $500,000 after a damning report found mistreatment of detainees. The new secretary of the Department of Immigration and Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs, Andrew Metcalfe, expressed his "deep regret and concern" over the findings of an independent report, released yesterday, into the transfer of five people between two detention centres in 2004. The Immigration Minister, Amanda Vanstone, also expressed "extreme disappointment and anger" at the treatment of the five detainees, who were transferred from Maribyrnong to the Baxter detention centre last September. The report found access to toilets was denied, which meant the detainees had to urinate in the compartments in the van transporting them. They were also denied adequate food and fluids, rest, exercise and medical treatment and were humiliated, the report says. The detention officers contracted to the Department of Immigration were also found to have applied force to one detainee. The report said complaints by the detainees were not taken seriously. It recommended an apology to the victims, changes to operational procedures, retraining of officers, disciplinary measures, a review of complaints handling procedures and surprise audits of detention centres. Mr Metcalfe admitted the incident represented "a very serious breach of contract provisions by Global Solutions Limited", the detention centre contractor.
Asylum mentality
The new slogan for Australia's tourist islands should be "beautiful one day, gone the next". Dozens of islands have effectively been booted off the list of official territories under a change to the migration zone. The Whitsundays, Lindeman, Hayman, Magnetic and Dunk islands are no longer part of Australia as far as asylum-seekers are concerned. Boat people will need to sail farther to reach the mainland before being able to claim refugee status and apply for visas. Every island off the coast between Mackay, on the Queensland coast, and Exmouth, in Western Australia, is not Australia for migration purposes. [...] The president of the community association on Magnetic island, Lorna Hempstead, said the change did not make locals feel less Australian.
"It's just an administrative title," the tour bus operator said. "The chances of boat people arriving here are almost zero."
Govt 'quietly' excises islands
A Just Australia (AJA) national coordinator Kate Gauthier said that if the government was bringing in genuine reform of asylum seeker policy, it would not at the same time be finding ways to cut the ability of people to claim asylum. "AJA remains firmly against any excision, on the basis that it is a backdoor method of dodging our responsibilities under the (United Nations) Refugee Convention to people who are in need of our protection as a democratic country," she said. "Either Australian territory is Australian or it isn't."
A bridge on the road to nowhere
The moment often comes at night. For years some have waited, after fleeing persecution and surviving a base, bare existence of detention where their day-to-day lives drag against a backdrop of suicides, depression and mental illness. Then, often unannounced, an official finally brings the papers to be signed, offering the beginning of a life in Australia. It should be the point where they start to think of themselves as among the lucky ones. But standing in the night air for the first time outside the razor wire, there is no road of freedom before them. Placed on what is known as a "bridging visa E", the former detainees are generally forbidden to work, cannot study and have no access to Medicare. As of last month, there were about 8000 people across Australia on this type of visa. It is seen as a short-term option by the Department of Immigration, but officials cannot say how long people have been on the visas and support groups insist some have held them for years.
Human Rights Commissioner welcomes release of children from immigration detention
“It has been a long road to reach this milestone, which has been arrived at only through the hard work and determination of a large network of NGOs, community groups and individuals, whose genuine compassion and belief in this cause has finally resulted in change,” said Dr Ozdowski. [...] “There have been several thousand children held in immigration detention over the past few years. As I said at the launch of the report [A last resort?] - let no child who arrives in Australia ever suffer under this system again.”
Families released from immigration detention centres
"This is the way forward for better refugee policy," said Ms Gauthier. "There is no need to detain everyone in high security settings for the whole time it takes to process refugee claims. The releases are living proof that there is a better way that doesn't compromise security or proper processes. "This is a belated but positive step forward - now we ask the Government to ensure the release programs for families are covered by regulations, so that there is no danger of families being detained in future.
42 children released from immigration detention
MARK COLVIN: All children and their families are now out of Australia's immigration detention centres. Since Wednesday, 42 children from 17 families have been released from five separate detention centres, including the Christmas Island facility, which is now vacant. It means the Federal Government has met the deadline set by the Prime Minister six weeks ago when he announced a softening of the Government's mandatory detention policy and promised to release all children from behind the razor wire. Now it will be largely up to non-government organisations like the Red Cross to help the families settle into Australian life.
Last detention children released
While the 39 children detained on the mainland, and their families, still face deportation if their refugee applications are rejected, the Christmas Island group will be free to live in the community for the three-year duration of their TPVs. Dianne Hiles of ChilOut, formed to advocate that all children be released from detention, said 18 children were released earlier today from the Port Augusta and Baxter detention centres in South Australia.
Refugee groups praise families' release
The coordinator of the refugee advocacy group Chilout, Alannah Sherry, says it is not clear how the community detention restrictions will be applied to the released families. "So far we've only spoken to one who was one of the first ones to leave Villawood [in Sydney] and she said yes, we can go down to the shops without being accompanied so that's a good sign," Ms Sherry said. Immigration Department (DIMIA) spokesman David Seal has confirmed the families will be allowed to spend time away from home without supervision.
Last children in detention freed today
Among those being released today is a girl with special care needs, the last child held at Maribyrnong. A spokesman for the department said she would be released with her family and her "special care needs will be met in her new residence". Three children from two families are leaving Baxter, in South Australia, while 15 children from eight families are being transferred from Immigration Department houses in Port Augusta to community housing.
Cry freedom as families let go
Apolonia Djami and her son George, 9, spent nine months in Villawood. She looked forward to shopping and calling friends. "I am so happy and stressed and relieved, all at the same time. But I'm still so sorry for all the detainees still in there," she said.
New Community Arrangements for Families In Detention
Minister for Immigration, Amanda Vanstone, announced that families in detention had today started moving into residence determination arrangements within the community as a result of her department’s, and others’ hard work and determination to put in place appropriate arrangements for these families. [...]
The residence determination arrangements have been put in place in partnership with non-government organisations, which will be funded by my department to take care of housing and living expenses for the families. ‘The NGOs will also provide case officers to assist these families and to ensure they have access to appropriate services.’ ‘I would like to extend my gratitude and appreciation to the Australian Red Cross and the other NGOs with whom they are working for the care role they are playing and their continuing commitment to working with us and the families. [...]
Senator Vanstone said that using her new Ministerial intervention powers she had decided to grant Temporary Protection Visas to the remaining Christmas Island caseload. There are currently 11 people, including three children, on Christmas Island whose visas will take effect from tomorrow, when they are expected to arrive in Perth. In addition, there is one adult currently in alternative detention in Perth, while another is on a Bridging Visa. Both will also receive TPVs.
All remaining 13 Viet boatpeople on Christmas Island get TPVs
"We applaud the Minister's decision, which accords with the Australian ethos of helping people facing persecution", said Mr. Doan, General Secretary of the Vietnamese Community in Australia. All of the other 40 fellow asylum seekers on the same boat, "Hao Kiet", have previously been given refugee status. They all are in virtually identical circumstances, having been involved in dropping pro-democracy leaflets. The Hanoi regime, which kills or imprisons anyone who disagrees with the one-Party rule it has written into Vietnam's Constitution, would harshly punish them if Australia returns them. "We call on the Australian Government to drop people-smuggling charges on 2 of the people on that boat. One is now recognised as a refugee, the other is an Australian citizen, neither gains any profit from organising the escape voyage, yet both have been given 5-year sentences. The people-smuggling law is meant to target criminals who organise trips for profit, not asylum seekers who flee persecution with their loved ones.
Children in detention freed
Australia has abandoned one of the most criticised aspects of its immigration policy having released scores of children from detention. Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone has pledged that all minors remaining in custody will be free by the weekend. “As of this morning there were 42 children from 20 families in immigration detention centres. By the end of this week, there will be none,” the minister said in a statement. “With this new, flexible approach for families, the government is maintaining its strong stance on border control while being sensitive to the special needs of families in detention.”
Australia frees children from immigration detention
Under the new arrrangements, families will live in the community but will have to be available to report to the Immigration Department. Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone says the families will be provided with accommodation, mainly through the Red Cross, although the government will foot the bill. Dianne Hiles from the refugee advocacy group, Chilout, says it is really important to get children out from behind razor wire. "It's a fantastic development that children are not being locked up in these terrible high security places that are no place for children," she said.
Last batch of children released
Authorities have today begun releasing 45 children and their families held in Australian immigration detention centres. The families of the 21 children held at Villawood were today allowed to leave the detention centre. But are not free. They have been housed in serviced apartments under a community detention plan.
Last detained children set for release
The children, from 20 families, were being transferred to community-based accommodation, Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone said. "By the end of this week, there will be none (in detention)," Senator Vanstone said. There had been 59 children in immigration detention when Prime Minister John Howard announced changes to the system for families in detention on June 17, she said. Fourteen had since been granted visas, two were in alternative detention, and one had turned 18. Those in alternative detention would also be released into the community by the end of the week.
Immigration scrambles to meet child release deadline
There is frantic activity in Australia's immigration detention centres today as officials try to deliver the Federal Government's promise to release children into the community.
Court opens door for refugees
MORE than 1000 asylum-seekers facing deportation may be able to stay in Australia after a groundbreaking Federal Court judgment yesterday undermined a key plank of the Howard Government's visa protection system. The full bench of the Federal Court ruled that asylum-seekers whose temporary protection visas had expired could not be deported unless the government proved their country of origin was safe. It means that TPV holders can no longer be forced to again prove their refugee status when their three-year visa expires -- a process that could lead to deportation. Under the new ruling, they could instead be issued with a permanent visa.
Homes not ready for freed children
The Immigration Minister, Amanda Vanstone, would not say yesterday whether the department would be able to release the 45 children still in detention by Friday, but said the tightness of the Sydney housing market meant some families might have to go into temporary accommodation.
Vanstone backtracks on Hwang case errors
SENATOR AMANDA VANSTONE: The advice I have is that the children were taken to the facility at the request of the mother, but not themselves technically detained. And that's perfectly understandable - a mother's detained, she's entitled to ask for her children to be brought to her.
MARK BANNERMAN: Michaela Byers, though, utterly rejects this explanation.
MICHAELA BYERS: There was no dire or immediate need for these children to be with their mother. They were in the care of their aunty, attending Stanmore Public School. Of course, upon news of what happened to their mother they would feel some distress, but there was no request by their mother that the children be with her in detention.
MARK BANNERMAN: In fact, the decision to detain Ian Hwang and his sister Janie, who was born in Australia, takes on a far more sinister overtone when you know the Department of Immigration intended to deport the whole family within 14 days of their detention. With the children on the way to Sydney Airport, the plan was foiled only when a Federal Court order was faxed to Korean Airlines.
When those children were picked up, the intention was very rapidly to deport them. Now you acted to stop that.
MICHAELA BYERS: That's correct.
MARK BANNERMAN: Had you not acted, what would have been the result?
MICHAELA BYERS: The department would have had an opportunity to deport their mistake and no one would have known and I believe it wouldn't be uncovered at all.
Mike Steketee: Something rotten in Immigration
The ramifications of [The Palmer Report's] findings about government abuse of power are profound and long-lasting. At least they should be, unless John Howard is allowed to escape by managing them away as a short-term political problem. They are captured eloquently by Mick Palmer, the former Federal Police commissioner, when he observes in his report that Immigration Department officers "are authorised to exercise exceptional, even extraordinary, powers. That they should be permitted and expected to do so without adequate training, without proper management and oversight, with poor information systems and with no genuine checks and balances on the exercises of these powers is of great concern."
Locked up family held illegally, says lawyer
A family released last night from Villawood detention centre after being locked up for four months had not been illegally in Australia, their lawyer said last night. [...] The family's lawyer, Michaela Byers, said the Immigration Department had reviewed the family's files and found they had been in Australia legally since 1998. "There's a been a review of their files - meaning their parents' previous visa applications - in which they've found that there was an error," Ms Byers told ABC Television. "So, since 1998, technically the family have been holding bridging visas and have not been illegal. "They've been in detention for four months, so the department's had many opportunities to review their file, and it appears that they only realised within the past couple of days that there had been an administrative error."
Children freed after DIMIA realises mistake
Two young children, who were seized from school four months ago and placed in Sydney's Villawood detention centre with their mother, are free tonight after a surprise decision by the Department of Immigration.
Qasim thanks govt for freedom at last
"I am greatly thankful to Minister Amanda Vanstone for giving me visa to live in the community," the 31-year-old said in a statement he read to reporters. "And I would [give] thanks to Mr Dick Smith and all the politicians and backbenchers and my lawyers and all the lovely supporters who worked hard to get me my freedom."
Australia frees 'Indian' migrant
"Now I can be free and I can walk outside and I can enjoy my freedom," he said. "I don't know what my future is now but I am happy to have a chance to live a normal life." Ms Vanstone said Mr Qasim would probably leave his hospital on Monday when his doctors returned to work. Critics of Australia's immigration policy have used Mr Qasim's case to argue that it is unjust and harsh. Labor immigration spokesman Tony Burke said: "After seven years in detention for a man who, by all accounts, has done absolutely nothing wrong other than want to become an Australian, surely they can give some certainty to his life." Under the terms of his visa, Mr Qasim is able to work and receive benefits but has to accept deportation if it is ordered. Commentators say that is unlikely as no country in seven years has said it will accept him.
Fall guys' soft landing
Immigration placated the tourism industry by making entry to Australia easier through electronic visas, at the same time placating the xenophobes by being ostentatiously harsh on some - only some - people who were not authorised to be in the country. In short, the administration of immigration policy was, and is, driven more by political spin than national interest. When it suited the Government's political agenda to encourage department officers to be ruthless and tough, it did so, for political ends. When it became a problem, the bureaucrats became the fall guys, albeit guys who fell into very comfortable new jobs.
Pressure mounts on Govt over immigration bungles
Despite its limited scope, the Palmer inquiry, which was set up by the Government to investigate the wrongful detention of Australian resident Cornelia Rau, has made damning findings against the Immigration Department and recommended an urgent need for change. The former federal police commissioner, Mick Palmer, found that there were systemic failures in the department which he says is dominated by a "culture of denial and self justification" and that the Government's contract with the company running the detention centres is "fundamentally flawed".
Liberty disregarded by DIMIA: Palmer report
The statement reads: "Protection of individual liberty is at the heart of Australian democracy". They're the first words in a set of principles underlying Australia's immigration detention policy. But the Palmer report shows that for two women, individual liberty was disregarded by the officers and managers of the Department of Immigration.
Howard's apology to victims of system
JOHN Howard has made an official apology to Cornelia Rau and Vivian Alvarez and flagged a shake-up of the Immigration Department after evidence of systemic failure in the organisation. [...] The Prime Minister embraced former federal police commissioner Mick Palmer's warning that change must come "from the top" by announcing the department's entire executive leadership would be moving on to new positions. Mr Howard also confirmed he would not support a royal commission or judicial inquiry into the matter, despite pleas for a further investigation from Ms Rau's family.
Commonwealth Ombudsman takes on immigration detention investigations
Commonwealth Ombudsman, Prof. John McMillan, is to undertake investigation of the 201 immigration detention matters identified by the Government. Mr Mick Palmer and Mr Neil Comrie and their team have partially undertaken an investigation of some of those matters, including the case of Ms Vivian Alvarez Solon. The Ombudsman announced that the Government has requested his office to continue the investigations under the Ombudsman Act 1976.
Commonwealth Ombudsman review of circumstances of long-term immigration detainees
From 29 June 2005, the Commonwealth Ombudsman’s office assumes the responsibility for conducting reviews of people who have been in immigration detention for two years or more. Under changes to the Migration Act 1958, the Department of Immigration, Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs (DIMIA) is now required to report to the Commonwealth Ombudsman every six months on the circumstances of each long-term detainee. The Ombudsman will examine each report and provide his independent assessment and recommendations on the appropriateness of the person’s detention arrangements to the Minister for Immigration, who must then table the assessment in Parliament. The Ombudsman may in his assessment recommend the release of a person, the granting of a permanent visa, the ongoing detention, or any other recommendation he considers appropriate.
Time to end failed detention system
"Both the Palmer Inquiry Report and the recent Auditor General's report has shown that outsourcing detention centres to private companies fails on all counts - legal, welfare and cost effectiveness. "It's time the Federal Government stopped ignoring the viable and effective alternative to detention that exists. Welfare agencies have been proposing it for over two years now.
Palmer Report fails to provide any real solutions
The ASRC is deeply concerned that the Palmer report will allow DIMIA to simply make cosmetic changes and avoid the complete overhaul that is required of our immigration system. DIMIA has already started embarking on an exercise of simply moving the deck chairs at a management level to create the impression of change (see press release of Peter Shergold, DIMIA Secretary http://www.pmc.gov.au/speeches/shergold/dimia_2005-07-14.cfm) rather than look to overhaul and change a detention system and culture that is unworkable, unjust and inherently harmful to asylum seekers.
Mental Anguish will Continue for Detainees
Senator Allison said Mick Palmer's scathing assessment of inadequate mental health treatment provided to immigration detainees has been highlighted in numerous submissions to the current Senate Inquiry into Mental Health. The Forum of Australian Services for Survivors of Torture and Trauma states in its submission that the "isolation and indefinite nature of detention under the constant threat of forced deportation is highly corrosive of mental health".
Family begins a new life after limbo of Nauru
There were tears of relief and joy as the Rehmatis - Mohammed Ali Rehmati, 39, his wife Alieya, 34, their daughters Ilham, 14, and Zahra, 7, and sons Mohammed Basit, 15, and Abbas, 9 - were greeted in Canberra by friends, community members and their migration agent Marion Le. [...] The Minister for Immigration, Amanda Vanstone, last week used her discretion to grant the family temporary protection visas - 3½ years after the family first attempted to reach Australia.
Freedom and friendship rediscovered
The Rehmati family, the last out of Nauru, arrived yesterday to an emotional reception from other Afghan families and migration agent Marion Le. Ilham Rehmati, 14, wept tears of joy as she hugged her friend Fahima Baqir. "I really missed her. I admire her, she's my best friend," Ilham said. Nauru, she said, was like a prison, especially after Fahima's family were granted visas in July last year and the pair were separated.
Tears for freed asylum family from Nauru
Ilham's sister, seven-year-old Zahra, was also reunited with her best friend Zahra Hussaini, who was released three weeks ago. The two Zahras were inseparable during their time on Nauru and will now start school together in Canberra. "I'm so happy she's here," Zahra Hussaini said. [...] A grateful Mr Rahmati spoke of his joy at the fact his children could now live a good life. But he urged the government to release the remaining 34 detainees on Nauru. "When I was on Air Nauru travelling to Brisbane I was crying for those people who are left on Nauru," Mr Rahmati said.
Nauru detention family calls for complete release
Ilham Rahmati, 14, says she is relieved to be settling in Canberra after almost four years on Nauru. "First I feel happy and then I feel my freedom, finally I got my freedom," she said. "I was like a prisoner there. My freedom was in my room. "I couldn't go out because I was single girl in there and now I feel free."
Back in the headlines, but now it's good news
Michael arrived in Melbourne on a Qantas domestic flight with 14 members of his extended family - his parents, grandmother, aunts, uncles and cousins - to begin a new life in Australia. The Vietnamese family had been detained on Christmas Island for nearly two years after fleeing Vietnam on the small fishing boat, the Hao Kiet, which was detected in Australian waters off Port Hedland in July 2003.
Activist teen in running for prize
At just 17, Hannah Monagle, from Kyneton, could be internationally recognised for her views on public affairs and human rights issues. [...] Hannah said visiting detainees at the Baxter Detention Centre in South Australia on three occasions was an eye-opener.
"Getting to know them beyond the news headlines has just been amazing," she said. "They really are beautiful people." As youth ambassador for Chill Out, which raises awareness of the plight of children in Australian detention centres, the teenager was among four young Australians who met Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone for breakfast last year.
IMMIGRATION DETENTION
The Australian Government has decided on a number of changes to both the law and the handling of matters relating to people in immigration detention. Read the full release...
Migration Amendment (Detention Arrangements) Act 2005
Read the amendments and briefings on the web site of A Just Australia.
Read the explanatory memorandum on the amendments.The bill has now passed both the lower and upper houses.
Our secret children
THESE are the faces of the 27 children being held in the Villawood detention centre who could soon be freed under new Federal Government laws. [...] Many of them can't remember life on the outside. But under the Government's proposed new laws the children could be released into the community in Sydney while their families' claims for residency are investigated and assessed by the Department of Immigration. [...]
ChilOut spokesperson Alanna Sherry said she was unsure how many of the families would now qualify for release, but was optimistic about the changes overall. "Living as a detainee family outside the razor wire is a vast improvement on living as a detainee family behind it. But it doesn't remove the uncertainty and the fear of the future," she said.
Work in progress
The co-ordinator of the action group ChilOut, Alanna Sherry, believes there should be a presumption against the detention of children and has called for an amendment to the Migration Act. [...] She acts as an intermediary between lawyers and detainees, and says she also wants to quash misinformation, as well as shine a light on the plight of those who are suffering. "It's amazing how many Villawood detainees don't know what their basic rights are," she says.
Christmas Is detention centre construction to continue
The Federal Government says the construction of a $300 million detention centre on Christmas Island will go ahead, despite changes to the Government's immigration policy.
Australian senate approves new immigration detention policy
Australia's upper house of parliament has approved changes to Australia's policy on detaining people who arrive in the country without visas.
Family held in detention on Nauru to live in Canberra
Canberra resident John Maloney has been helping families to resettle and says it will take time for the Rehmatis to feel comfortable. [...] "Within 12 months one would hope that they have a sense of being part of our Canberra community and are happy here and are prepared to stay here."