BY SARAH STEPHEN
On December 20, Afghan refugee Riz Wakil, living on a temporary protection visa that is about to expire, received a letter from the immigration department. The letter informed him that he had until June 30 to take up the government's "reintegration" package and return voluntarily to Afghanistan.
It included a "voluntary return" statement for him to sign. If he does not take up the offer by June 30, he will forfeit eligibility for the $2000. On the second page, the letter listed the range of appeals that must be abandoned as a condition for accepting the reintegration package. This included withdrawing from any claim or appeal process before the Refugee Review Tribunal, the Administrative Appeals Tribunal or any Australian courts.
What's more, refugees are "required to formally withdraw any matters before UN treaty bodies such as the UN Committee Against Torture or the UN Human Rights Commission" before they leave Australia.
Wakil told Green Left Weekly: "It's so insulting. Those of us who left our families in Afghanistan, who faced torture and imprisonment, we didn't come to Australia for $2000! I estimate that if the government allowed people on temporary protection visas to travel, 90% would not go back with the $2000 on offer. [But] they would do anything to be able to see their families.
"It's for this reason that a small number might agree to the reintegration package. But we are very wary of what our acceptance might mean for the future. If something goes wrong in Afghanistan, we fear that by signing this form we would never be able to apply for asylum in Australia again."
As of January 1, only 40 Afghan asylum seekers from onshore detention centres have returned under the reintegration package. On Nauru, where detention conditions are appalling, 274 asylum seekers have returned to Afghanistan. Since the reintegration package was extended on December 16 to all Afghan temporary protection visa holders, Wakil doesn't know of any who have accepted the offer.
Now, with a looming deadline, Wakil thinks, "perhaps 10-15% might go back before June 30. What I'm concerned about is that the immigration department will no doubt use this to say, 'These people went back without any problems. Why can't the rest of you go back too?'. It will be easier to return the remaining refugees forcibly."
This increased pressure on refugees to go back to Afghanistan is an amazing affront given what the government tells Australians about the situation in Afghanistan. The current foreign affairs travel advice says: "Australians should defer all travel to Afghanistan until further notice... The country is not safe for tourism. The security situation in Afghanistan remains very uncertain outside Kabul and overland travel outside the city carries significant danger. Warlords control many areas and travel in these areas can be very dangerous.
"There is the added danger that some Taliban and al-Qaeda fighters may remain in parts of the country thereby creating a significant security risk. Recent terrorist activity within Kabul has also highlighted the need for extreme vigilance in the city. There are groups seeking to destabilise the Afghanistan transitional government by undertaking terrorist acts against members of the government."
Wakil also has stories. "Some people rampaged through a market in Lashkargah", he said, "destroying people's stalls and robbing them. They particularly targeted one of the three streets where the stall-keepers were [from the minority] Hazaras, bulldozing around 200 shops. The keepers went to see the local area commander, who backed the wreckers, giving their action official endorsement by telling the keepers that their shops weren't approved. The reporter claimed that the government is still not trying to build a society where all Afghans are equal."
Wakil is furious at the cold, calculated way the Australian government has pressured Afghan asylum seekers to go home. "First they tried to discredit us, arguing that many Afghans were actually from Pakistan, or Iran or Tajikistan. Then they offered us $2000 to return voluntarily, but when no-one took it up, they set a deadline. Perhaps after the deadline is up, if not enough Afghans go back, they will cut our social security."
Asked about the Australian government's capacity to forcibly return Afghan refugees, given the Afghan government's opposition to it, Wakil explained: "The Afghan government's main concern was that it not be overloaded with returns at a time when they were struggling to cope with the Afghans who had returned from neighbouring countries. Kabul asked countries to stop sending refugees back until spring this year". Spring starts in August.
Wakil is angry at the inhuman treatment of Afghan refugees. "Some young Afghans find themselves in a no-win situation. To be in limbo in Australia for three years was the best of bad luck. Many couldn't get on with their lives and study because they were worried about their future. But they expected things to change at the end of three years."
Now, even that hope has gone, because the government has put every Afghan refugee, whether their three-year temporary protection visa had expired or not, on a Class XC bridging visa.
This new visa, created through regulation changes on November 1, is open-ended. It maintains all the restrictions of a temporary protection visa, but leaves a refugee facing even greater uncertainty because it remains valid, according to immigration department guidelines, only "until a holder's application for a further protection visa is finally determined".
"This could be six months, or six years", Wakil commented. A refugee could be left in limbo until the government deems it safe for him or her to return to the country he or she fled from. The government no longer has a deadline it must meet to decide refugee cases. "For me, fleeing to Australia was never just about finding protection" said Wakil. "I want to continue my political activity, to study, to travel to see my family. I want the right to live a normal life in Australia."
Wakil told GLW that Iranians whose visas recently expired also got notification that they were now on an XC bridging visa. A significant number of Iranians Wakil knows feel utterly defeated and are deciding to go back.
Iraqi asylum seekers are rightly concerned that their fate might be the same as Afghan refugees. If the US installs a new regime on a defeated Iraq, the Australian government could use it as a pretext for sending Iraqi refugees back.
On December 20, 150 Iraqis from all over Australia gathered in Canberra to protest about the uncertainty of their future. A delegation met with Peter Templeton, an evasive immigration department representative, who told them that 15 Iraqis would get notification of their permanent visa on January 5.
Abdul Gafor Almusadal, one of the Iraqis in the delegation, told GLW: "Nobody received notification on January 5, and when I questioned Templeton about it, he pretended he had used that date just as an example!"
To Almusadal's knowledge, Iraqis haven't yet received letters about the CX bridging visa, although one Sydney man whose visa expired is on a bridging visa. No Iraqi temporary protection visa holder has been given a permanent visa.
Abdul recounted a friend's story that his family had heard immigration minister Philip Ruddock interviewed on Al Jazeera TV in Qatar. Ruddock reportedly said that his government was not going to give Iraqis permanent visas; that they would wait until things changed in Iraq before sending them back
This latest move reveals the utter fraud of temporary visas. The vast bulk of the 12,000 temporary protection visa holders, perhaps 90%, are from Iraq and Afghanistan.
If the government succeeds in sending them all back to the countries they fled from, the net intake of refugees between 1999 and 2002 will have been only two-thirds of the 12,000 annual commitment. Only 24,122 permanent places were filled over three years, instead of the required 36,000.
The immigration department has robbed thousands of Afghan and Iraqi refugees of their human rights by denying them the right to stay in Australia.
From Green Left Weekly, January 22, 2003.
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