A coalition of 300 schools and churches from around Australia have asked that a memorial to the SIEV-X tragedy, currently standing on the Canberra lakeshore in Weston Park, be allowed to remain in place for a further 12 months. The SIEV-X boat sunk in October 2001 while en route to Australia from Indonesia, drowning 353 asylum seekers, many of them children.
ACT Chief Minister Jon Stanhope, who launched the memorial last month, supports maintaining it in place as a permanent icon of the Canberra landscape.
The ALP has pledged to make the memorial permanent if it wins this year's federal election, and the SIEV-X memorial project organisers have applied to the National Capital Authority for an extension so that more Australians can see the memorial.