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Panel urges Australia to send boatpeople offshore
Agence France Presse - August 13, 2012
An expert panel headed by former defence chief Angus Houston said Canberra should introduce greater disincentives to stop would-be refugees from paying people-smugglers to bring them by boat to Australia. "Onshore processing encourages people to jump on a boat," Houston said.
The much-awaited independent report also called on Canberra to work closely with Indonesia, a transit country for many boatpeople, and Malaysia to stem the influx of maritime arrivals as well as lift its annual humanitarian intake.
"Over time, a comprehensive regional framework will reduce the lure of irregular maritime migration but until then, the panel believes Australia needs to include the prospect of processing options outside of Australia," it said.
"To support this, it is the panel's view that the Australian parliament should agree, as a matter of urgency, to legislation that will allow for the processing of irregular maritime arrivals in locations outside Australia."
More than 100 boats carrying over 7,500 suspected asylum-seekers have arrived in Australia so far this year, after the government failed to pass legislation aimed at deterring them by sending them to Malaysia.
The so-called "Malaysia solution" would have seen boatpeople arriving in Australia transferred to the Southeast Asian nation, with Canberra resettling thousands of that country's registered refugees in return.
The proposal was scuttled by the opposition and the Greens, who refused to pass laws allowing off-shore processing, prompting the government to ask Houston to review the policy in hopes of breaking the political deadlock.
His panel recommended the government urgently reopen processing centres on the tiny Pacific island state of Nauru and on Papua New Guinea's Manus Island as a "circuit breaker" to the current surge in arrivals.
It also called for Canberra to lift its annual humanitarian intake to about 20,000, up from the current 13,750, and consider increasing it further to 27,000 within five years.
While Australia remains a minor destination country for asylum-seekers, receiving just 2.5 percent of global claims in 2011, some 964 asylum-seekers and crew have lost their lives at sea while en route since 2001. Of those, some 604 have perished since October 2009.
"And we were dismayed to learn this morning that another 67 asylum-seekers are believed to be missing," Houston said in reference to a boat that reportedly left Indonesia in late June and has not been heard from since. "Like all Australians, we are deeply concerned about this tragic loss of life at sea," he said. "To do nothing is unacceptable."
The conservative opposition said the report backed its policy to reopen Nauru, and highlighted its reservations about the Malaysia deal which the panel said had potential but could be strengthened to better protect human rights.
But Greens leader Christine Milne attacked the findings as "cruel", saying they would potentially "set up a chain of detention centres right across the Pacific".
Refugee advocates also condemned the prospect of offshore processing, long adopted by the major parties in Australia but essentially closed down by Labor after it took office in 2007.
"If the panel's arrangements are implemented, refugees will suffer and languish in Nauru (and) Manus Island," Refugee Action Coalition spokesman Nick Riemer said.
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