BY VIV MILEY & SARAH STEPHEN
On the weekend of September 22-23, more than 300 asylum seekers had been sitting in boats off Ashmore Reef and the Cocos Islands for days — some for close to two weeks — and the government has yet to announce their fate.
After taking turns bailing water to keep afloat, on September 21 Australian authorities finally allowed 68 Sri Lankans to be transferred to shore from their leaking boat moored off the Cocos Islands, north-west of the Australian mainland in the Indian Ocean.
As the first asylum seekers to step onto Australian soil since the crisis involving the asylum seekers on the MV Tampa began, they will also be the first to get a taste of Australia's toughened approach. Under legislation set to be passed by the Senate this week, the Sri Lankans will be processed in the same way as the Tampa asylum seekers shipped to the Pacific island of Nauru.
"Any applications they might make under current circumstances ... as soon as the law is passed that application becomes invalid", a spokesperson for immigration minister Philip Ruddock said on September 21.
Under the border protection legislation, the asylum seekers would only be eligible for temporary visas, with no recourse for permanent residency in Australia if they are found to be refugees. If found to not be refugees they would be sent home. They will be processed under United Nations High Commission for Refugees procedures.
The government's planned transfer of Afghan asylum seekers on board the MV Tampa to New Zealand and Nauru was put on hold briefly on August 31 when the Victorian Council for Civil Liberties launched a legal challenge in the Federal Court.
On September 11, Federal Court Justice Tony North found that the Australian government had acted illegally when it arbitrarily detained the asylum seekers on board the Tampa, and ruled that they be brought directly to Australia to have their asylum claims processed.
It seemed at first that the judgement could threaten the government's elaborate scheme to prevent the 660 Afghan and Iraqi asylum seekers from reaching Australia.
While the Labor Party had earlier rejected the government's Border Protection Bill, in the aftermath of the North decision it caved in and agreed to new legislation that will further restrict the rights of asylum seekers arriving by boat, by excising Christmas Island, the Cocos Islands and Ashmore Reef from Australia's "migration zone".
These areas will remain Australian territory for all purposes except migration, which will mean that making an asylum application from one of these locations will be treated the same as an application made in Indonesia.
By a two-to-one majority, the full bench of the Federal Court overturned the North decision on September 17, following a federal government appeal.
The decision has opened the way for the government to land the asylum seekers on Nauru, and has also given Howard, now with guaranteed support from Labor, a free hand to introduce a whole raft of planned legislation.
Legislation set to pass through the Senate will mean that only those asylum seekers who do not pass through an intermediate country that processes refugee claims will be eligible for permanent residency after a three-year temporary protection visa (TPV). But those who do and then land on Australia's external territories will never have a chance at gaining permanent residency, only TPVs.
This is one of six pieces of legislation designed to make life tougher for asylum seekers, and act as a "deterrent" to further boatloads making the journey.
The legislation includes border protection measures reinforcing the right to turn boats around with force. Dormant legislation already before parliament, but revived with Labor's new pledge of "bipartisanship", includes restricting access to judicial review, banning class actions and enshrining the UN's interpretation of persecution to prevent judges from being too lenient.
Lawyers for Melbourne solicitor Eric Vadarlis lodged an application on September 20 for special leave to appeal to the High Court in the Tampa asylum seekers' case — but the appeal will not be able to be heard if the government's Border Protection Bill is passed.
The HMAS Manoora finally reached Nauru on September 19. After more than 30 days at sea, the first group of Afghans were happy to leave the ship. When they walked up the concrete concourse from Nauru's boat harbour, two men had a banner stretched between them that read, "Thanks from honourable Govt of Naru (sic) for giving protection and shelters for Afghan refugees."
Of those taken ashore, some were able to speak to the media about their ordeal. They explained it was the cramped and uncomfortable conditions aboard the Manoora that was the main reason for going ashore, with only three toilets for over 660 asylum seekers.
The Age's correspondent in Nauru, Craig Skehan, spoke to some of the young Afghan men on September 20.
"One, a 24-year-old teacher, said he still hoped to settle in Australia. 'We came from Afghanistan to Pakistan and then to Jakarta and we tried to get to Australia because we had heard that Australians are kind people,' he said. 'But I think the Australian government was kind of cruel to us. Your Prime Minister should know that things are very bad in Afghanistan and they are getting worse.' He said he had only just learnt of the terrorist attacks in the United States and felt sorry for the families of those who had been killed.
"A group of Afghan men around him, in response to a question, said almost in unison that there could be no terrorists among them and several laughed at the suggestion. 'We don't want to make any trouble,' one said. 'We are respectable people, nearly all professionals, tradesmen and shopkeepers. We have a carpenter, an architect and even a doctor.' Other Iraqis talked about many members of their families having been arrested and executed in their homeland. Another man said: 'They hung my uncle. They kill everyone in Iraq'."
The ordeal, however, is not over yet. While around 300 of the asylum seekers have left the Manoora, as many as 230, mostly Palestinian and Iraqi asylum seekers, are still refusing to leave the ship until they are taken to Australia. On September 22, the Australian government was not ruling out the use of force by the military to end the stand-off.
Iraqis at the Nauru detention centre said a large number of those still on board the Manoora had not accepted arguments that it would be in their best interests to disembark. An Iraqi woman told the September 21 Sydney Morning Herald, "They don't want to get off the ship. Some people think if they don't get off they will go to Australia."
With the US having declared a "war on terrorism", the already miserable plight of people in Afghanistan and Iraq, and throughout the Middle East, is set to become much worse. Yet the actions of both Labor and the Coalition will doubtless push the problem elsewhere, deepening the misery of people suffering the worst conditions of poverty and repression on the planet.
Few Afghan refugees have the chance to be resettled through "official" migration channels. An overburdened and under-resourced UNHCR is turning people away in their thousands from its Pakistani offices. For their safety and the safety of the families, many take the risk of selling possessions to pay people smugglers for passage to Europe or Australia.
The least Australia can do is take in those who have the bravery, resourcefulness and desperation to risk their lives to come here.
[For more information on the refugee camps on the Afghan/Pakistan border, visit <http://www.afghanrefugees.com>.]