BY ROB GRAHAM
ADELAIDE — “I’ve been reticent to express my support for refugees
before, but after this weekend everyone needs to go back and speak to as
many people as they can and join in any organised demonstrations. We can
start really getting people to think about the inhumanity of it all.” —
Janine Chugg, a refugee-rights protester at the Woomera detention centre,
told Green Left Weekly.
In a fabulous display of solidarity, around 1000 people travelled to
South Australia's far north between March 28 and April 1 to protest the
federal government's treatment of refugees and show their support to detainees
in the Woomera desert refugee prison.
“I'm here because there's an obscenity on our doorstep, and it's got
to go”, Hugh, an activist from Adelaide, told GLW. Ray, who came
to Australia as a Palestinian refugee, had similar reasons. “I want to
show the detainees that there is understanding and compassion for their
plight among the Australian public”, he said.
Woomera is Australia’s most notorious refugee prison — many of its inmates
have been living in its blistering heat for years, suffering beatings,
solitary confinement, denial of access to toilets as punishment for protest,
widespread depression, and without access to education or broader community
contact.
The first protesters arrived at the centre's outer perimeter fence on
the evening of March 28. They resisted police attempts to force them away
from the detention centre, into the township of Woomera, and set up camp
near the fence.
Most protesters arrived on Friday, March 29, and that evening marched
down to the detention centre. Approaching the outer fence, protesters saw
detainees standing on the one of the centre's roofs, waving and shouting.
The heavy police presence protest organisers had expected didn’t eventuate.
A few activists leapt onto the outer fence, bringing it down and the protesters
swarmed towards the inner fence, where we could see and speak with detainees.
Writing for Melbourne Indymedia, Katie Dowling described what happened
next: “Soon this energy was manifest in a way no-one thought possible.
One moment, activists and refugees were akimbo on either side of the outer
fence; the next, a gap had been torn between two of the palings that stood
in the row of shiny steel teeth. The teeth were parted and a stream of
detainees spewed forth.”
According to members of Melbourne’s Refugee Action Collective who travelled
to the protest, the initiative for the escapes was taken by the refugees
themselves, and was not planned by the protesters.
“For the first time in a long time [the Woomera detainees] had a chance
to make a choice on Friday night”, No One Is Illegal activist Andrea Maksimovic
wrote to the Australian Human Rights news group on April 4. “And just like
the rest of us they made different choices. Some climbed the two barbed
wire fences and escaped, some didn’t. If there is anything I bemoan about
our actions on Friday night it is that we were not prepared, we underestimated
their will for freedom.”
Some escaping detainees were caught and thrown into a police van, which
was then surrounded by protesters chanting “Freedom!”. Mounted police forced
the protesters to disperse and the van left. Some of the protesters were
also arrested. Several refugees allegedly made it to the protesters' camp
site.
The captured detainees were taken to Woomera police station, where,
according to “Monkey”, a protester at Woomera, they gave Australian protesters
they shared a cell with a note, which said: “We have made the world hell
with racism, colours, religionism, ethnics and so on. Businesses and wrong
diplomacy. ACM [Australasian Correctional Management] is bad, Australian
government is bad, Australian people are good. Detention centre still continues
day by day. You will see what is going on.”
The atmosphere back at the camp was very tense that night. Police set
up a road block and checked identification documents of everyone leaving
or entering the camp. They were also rumoured to be threatening to use
tear gas to force entry to a tent, surrounded by protesters, that allegedly
contained escaped detainees.
An anonymous posting to Melbourne Indymedia said: “It was strange spending
a night in a camp surrounded on all sides by a police line. It must have
been worse for the detainees that were with us, surrounded by a line of
cops that wanted to put them back in a cage.
“They told us during the night of the beatings and suffering inside
the camp. They told us of the endless wait — 24 months, 26 months — just
to know whether they could stay in Australia on a temporary visa or whether
they would be deported back to face persecution, imprisonment or death.
All wanted to get out of the camp and to Adelaide or some major city.”
While some protesters were uneasy about the implications of the refugees'
escape and there were different views on what to do next, the overwhelming
sentiment was to assist the asylum seekers. “There is no choice”, another
anonymous posting to Indymedia argued. “It was not a question of whether
to help but how.” Maksimovic agrees, emphasising that the refugees chose
to escape: “Let’s give [the refugees] some [credit for] political agency,
let’s restore them some dignity”.
The latter Indymedia writer also claimed that he or she had spoken to
one of the escaped refugees, who had been inside Woomera for a year, and
hadn’t seen or heard from his family for more than 18 months. “[The detention
centre] was like prison”, the refugee allegedly said. “There is nothing
to do, all we do is eat and sleep, eat and sleep. I can’t go back inside.”
Inside the prison, ACM guards attempted a full muster of detainees to
get a head count so as to work out how many and who had actually escaped.
The detainees resisted and were met with tear gas and beatings.
On March 30, despite a “spokescouncil” decision not to engage in civil
disobedience that day, protesters could not resist pushing aside the flimsy
outer fence again. They attempted to deliver $3000 worth of toys to the
prison for refugee children, but the police refused to deliver them until
protesters “left the restricted area”. The action ended in a spontaneous
celebration with music and dancing at, and on, the fallen sections of the
outer fence.
On Easter Sunday, March 31, because protesters had been told that detainees
had been moved to the rear of the prison, we decided to march around the
main fence making as much noise as possible, and letting the prisoners
know we were still there.
By the time the march reached the main gates, several detainees were
already on the roof of a small building with a banner: “We are victim of
politics. We refugees have request from Australian people for help.” Around
30 detainees climbed onto buildings and we were able to exchange chants
with them like, “Where is human rights?” and “Free the refugees — out now!”
The detainees also chanted “Thank you, thank you” and “We love you,
we love you”. The head cop tried to read the riot act (twice), but was
drowned out both times.
The march moved off around the prison and we were able to speak to other
detainees on the opposite side. When asked if the toys had been delivered,
a woman said that they hadn't and then a man yelled “We don't want toys,
we want freedom!”
Several paddy wagons had been brought up by this stage and eight protesters
separated from the main group were arrested for trespass. When we heard
that a water cannon had been brought out, we decided to move as a group
back to our camp. Once again, spirits were high, even as an unmarked police
helicopter circled low over the camp taking photos.
To help escaped detainees is an offence under Australian law. Nearly
30 protesters were arrested during the weekend. Around 20 of them are facing
charges which carry hefty jail sentences.
No-one who participated in the Woomera protest will ever forget it,
and the action was a big success in highlighting the gross violations of
human rights that occur in Australia’s desert refugee concentration camps.
Over the Easter weekend, solidarity protests were held — from Maribyrnong
and Villawood to Berlin, Edinburgh and New York. If we extend and deepen
these protests, making them bigger and more inclusive, then we can end
the inhumane policy of mandatory detention of “illegal” asylum seekers
and free, not just a few refugees, but them all.
[Rob Graham is a member of the Democratic Socialist Party.]
From Green Left Weekly, April 10, 2002.
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