So Nauru, the little island where Australia dumps people seeking asylum, has now forced out its magistrate and chief justice – gravely damaging the rule of law in the process.
The crisis provides a striking confirmation of Australia’s role in the region. It’s a steroid soaked neighbourhood bully drunk with power, casually coward punching the inhabitants of the Pacific.
The fanatical exclusion of refugees necessarily leads to an imitation of the regimes the persecuted are fleeing. If the Sri Lankan government scoffs at Tamil claims of oppression, so, too, does the Australian government – even as it detains Tamils in camps not so dissimilar from those they have fled.
At the same time, the anti-refugee obsession mandates closer Australian ties with authoritarian regimes. For example, to assist the Sri Lankan government in stopping Tamil boats, Tony Abbott offered military hardware to its military. He also undermined the international campaign against Sri Lankan human rights abuses by publicly announcing that, while his government deplores the use of torture, "we accept that sometimes in difficult circumstances difficult things happen". Full story...
Related posts:
The crisis provides a striking confirmation of Australia’s role in the region. It’s a steroid soaked neighbourhood bully drunk with power, casually coward punching the inhabitants of the Pacific.
The fanatical exclusion of refugees necessarily leads to an imitation of the regimes the persecuted are fleeing. If the Sri Lankan government scoffs at Tamil claims of oppression, so, too, does the Australian government – even as it detains Tamils in camps not so dissimilar from those they have fled.
At the same time, the anti-refugee obsession mandates closer Australian ties with authoritarian regimes. For example, to assist the Sri Lankan government in stopping Tamil boats, Tony Abbott offered military hardware to its military. He also undermined the international campaign against Sri Lankan human rights abuses by publicly announcing that, while his government deplores the use of torture, "we accept that sometimes in difficult circumstances difficult things happen". Full story...
Related posts:
- Australia’s treatment of refugees is 'cruel and mean-spirited’
- Christmas Island: patients endangered by IT flaws and drug shortages...
- Australia sending refugees to Papua New Guinea, where they are abused...
- Kevin Rudd's statement on sending all boat asylum seekers to Papua New Guinea...
- Asylum seeker riots escalate in Australia's Christmas Island ...
- Asylum seekers in Australia sew their lips together in detention protest...
- Australia's refugee crisis...
- Why Australia jails Indonesian kids...
- Australia pressures Tamil refugees to return to Sri Lanka...
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