BY SARAH STEPHEN
For the past 18 months, through a brutal policy of deterrence by force, the federal government has been able to temporarily isolate Australia from the reality that vast numbers of people in the Middle East and South-East Asia are desperately seeking refuge from war, persecution or poverty.
The notion that immigration minister Philip Ruddock could seal Australia's borders off from the rest of the world was dealt a blow on July 1 when the Haokiet, a small fishing boat carrying 53 Vietnamese refugees, made it to within three kilometres of the Western Australian coast, near the Port Hedland immigration processing centre, before being spotted by an Australian Customs Service vessel.
The Haokiet's passengers were the first group of refugees to have made it to Australian territory by boat since December 2001. Ruddock was forced to admit that by reaching the migration zone, they would have to be processed under Australian law.
Despite this, the government was determined to punish them as an example to others. Ruddock ordered that the Haokiet's passengers be transported 1800km out into the Indian Ocean to Christmas Island for processing. He explained on July 2 that this was "in order to make it abundantly clear that people are not reaching the Australian mainland". Asked on July 8 if the government was prepared to spend whatever it cost to ensure the refugees were not processed on the mainland, Prime Minister John Howard replied: "Certainly".
Labor immigration spokesperson Nicola Roxon argued on July 6 that it will cost an additional $10 million to process the Vietnamese refugees' claims on Christmas Island rather than on the mainland. The cost of detention on the island is $293 a day, compared with average cost at Port Hedland detention centre of $87 a day.
It cost an estimated $4 million to transport the refugees on the naval frigate HMAS Canberra to Christmas Island. Further costs are associated with flying dozens of immigration department staff, migration agents and Australasian Correctional Management guards to Christmas Island and re-opening the island's mothballed and only partly constructed detention centre.
Detainees are being housed in a series of demountable buildings located near the island's rubbish dump.
Melbourne lawyer Eric Vadarlis said on July 8 that it would be difficult for the Vietnamese refugees to gain proper legal advice on the island. "There's no doubt they've put them over there to stop lawyers seeing them."
What's more, it is far more difficult for refugee supporters and the media to make contact with refugees held on Christmas Island thus limiting reporting of what is happening to the refugees to government statements.
Furthermore, the government does not want the media to humanise refugees — which is why the immigration department has taken a hostile attitude to the decision by a number of newspapers to publish photos of the Vietnamese refugees in the days after their arrival on Christmas Island.
The government even went to some lengths to rule out any contact between refugees and members of a parliamentary migration committee. The committee left the island on a chartered flight on July 5 after being told that HMAS Canberra was still a day away, but the frigate steamed in an hour later with the refugees.
"It was all very suspicious", said Labor MP Julia Irwin. "Why weren't we told they were coming in earlier... We could have delayed our trip by a couple of hours just to see the process take place."
Ruddock denied there had been a conspiracy to get the MPs off the island before the refugees arrived.
Nguyen Van Hoa, an Australian citizen of Vietnamese descent, was charged on July 4 in a Port Hedland court under section 232(A) of the Migration Act with the federal offence of illegally facilitating passage to Australia, which attracts a maximum 20-year jail sentence.
Refugee advocates have questioned how an Australian citizen could be charged with people smuggling when he was accompanying family members to Australia. All the asylum seekers on the Haokiet were members of the same extended family.
During an unsuccessful application for bail on July 19, Nguyen's solicitor, Caroline Brookes, said he had not organised the Haokiet's journey to Australia for money, but "to bring family members from Vietnam". Nguyen was remanded in custody to reappear in court on August 8.
From Green Left Weekly, July 23, 2003.
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