Onto the streets to free the refugees!

January 30, 2002
Issue 

The Coalition government is facing a serious political crisis. The desperate and heroic actions of more than 300 hunger strikers at Woomera and Maribyrnong detention centres have again focused the spotlight on the inhumanity and illegality of the government's refugee policy.

A few months ago — during the federal election campaign — the government and the "opposition" ALP were united in their hard line on refugees. But now the cracks in the major parties have started to widen. The resignation of Neville Roach, a senior adviser to immigration minister Philip Ruddock, and the breaking of ranks by senior Tasmanian Liberal Greg Barnes, point to mounting concern about the bipartisan refugee policy.

Under pressure, Labor opposition leader Simon Crean has announced a softening of the ALP's support for mandatory detention.

Australia is the only rich country in the world to compulsorily detain all asylum seekers who arrive without documentation. Ruddock and Prime Minister John Howard insist that the slightest concession — such as releasing refugee children from the detention centres — risks unpicking the mandatory detention policy.

They are right. This morally repugnant policy is in a crisis that will only be ended with its total repeal.

As a result of the recent hunger strikes, Australia has come under growing international criticism. Demonstrations are being organised outside Australian embassies and consulates: the first outside the consulate in Auckland, New Zealand, on Australia Day. The January 24 edition of the UK Independent described Woomera as being worse than Guantanamo Bay in Cuba where Washington's Taliban and al Qaeda prisoners are being held. Ironically, the detained asylum seekers now on hunger strike fled the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.

The Independent article said: "To the shame of Australia, the protest at Woomera and elsewhere is about things that can be remedied: the ability of the authorities to organise the asylum applications, to process them in a reasonable time, and to produce a transparently fair outcome. That people who arrived with such hope have been reduced so soon to despair is an indictment of their treatment, and of Australia."

Previously, Australia's racist image was associated with Pauline Hanson. Now that Howard and the Labor opposition have adopted Hanson's refugee policies, it's clear who is responsible for the racist revival. The capitalist's two parties of government are seen by many as morally bankrupt — and it is this which is troubling a growing section of the establishment. Concerns about trade, about Australia's international reputation, are some of the other reasons why the cracks are starting to widen, even in the ruling class.

Ruddock's efforts to regain support by accusing refugee parents of abusing their children by allegedly forcing them to sew their lips in protest — an accusation that the detainees have firmly denied — will have limited effect. The government is trying to criminalise the refugees' legitimate protest. We have a duty to support their right to protest and there is no better way to do this than by joining them in protest.

With the government losing support, we need to push pro-refugee campaigning ahead with a renewed sense of urgency. The opportunity for a campaign of escalating mass demonstrations must not be squandered. If we take to the streets in hundreds of thousands over the next few weeks to demand an immediate end to the inhumane, bi-partisan policy on refugees we can force the government to retreat.

Green Left Weekly urges its readers to get active in this movement for change. As a campaigning newspaper we will be throwing all our resources behind this urgent struggle. Join in the demonstrations around the country and join the convergence in Canberra on February 12 when parliament sits again. Our struggle for global solidarity, and against the rule of law which promotes bigotry, racism and xenophobia, starts with showing our solidarity with the refugees imprisoned in Woomera, Maribyrnong, Villawood and Port Hedland.

From Green Left Weekly, January 30, 2002.
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