UWA to become a refugee safe haven?

BY FEDERICO FUENTES

PERTH — Refugees' rights activists at the University of Western Australia pledged to turn their campus into a refugee safe haven at the launch of the campaign on August 8. The campaign is being organised by the UWA Refugee Rights Action Network.

At the next annual general meeting of the UWA student guild, UWARRAN will move for a referendum to be held to allow students to vote on whether UWA will be made a safe haven and that the guild donate $2000 to assist escaped refugees and the free the refugees campaign.

UWA student guild AGMs have not achieved a quorum since the early 1990s because the meetings have not been properly advertised; a quorum is more than 100 students.

UWARRAN activists believe that they can get quorum for this year's AGM.

Already, more than 150 signatures in favour of a referendum have been collected in less than three days of campaigning. UWARRAN will be screening footage of the Easter protests outside the Woomera refugee prison during UWA's social justice week, which begins on August 19.

From Green Left Weekly, August 14, 2002.

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From GLW issue 504