Refugees & migrants

The search and rescue of some 90 asylum seekers still missing at sea continues after a boat capsized 200 kilometres from Christmas Island on June 21. Sydney's Refugee Action Coalition released the statement below on June 22. * * *   From the timeline of contacts between Australian authorities and the capsized asylum boat indicated by Home Affairs Minister Jason Clare, it seems that more timely action by the Australian rescue authorities could have averted the latest asylum boat tragedy.  

The first Green Left Report features: Austin Mackell (independent journo in Egypt); Cassie Findlay (Support Assange & WikiLeaks Coalition); David Hicks; Carlo Sands; the Christmas Carol Crims; WikiLeaks advert + more!

Over 2000 people marched in Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Canberra and Adelaide to protest twenty years of mandatory detention and to mark World Refugee Day on the weekend of June 16-17.

Protesters tore through a giant run-through banner that read "free the refugees" as part of World Refugee Day rally in Melbourne. Below the slogan, symbolic bars were broken representing the breaking of the fences imprisoning refugees.

The Refugee Action Coalition Sydney released the statement below on June 5. * * * The Four Corners’ people smuggling program [“Smuggler’s Paradise”] has only added to the demonisation that surrounds the media and politicians’ portrayal of people smugglers.

Private-detention centre operator Serco and the department of immigration have taken steadily more aggressive action to prevent refugees in detention from speaking out about their conditions. They have done this by moving to restrict and curtail visits to detainees, and have banned several individuals.

What would Australia look like if Tony Abbott became the next prime minister? The Liberal leader is an outspoken climate denier, a hardliner on locking out refugees, determined to crack down on union and workers’ rights and wants to extend racist and draconian attacks on Aboriginal rights. Yet polls have consistently shown Abbott and the Coalition far ahead of the Julia Gillard Labor government, whose pro-business policies and internal scandals have made it deeply unpopular.

The 2012 Resistance conference, in Adelaide July 20-22, will feature international guests including from CLASSE in Quebec (the largest and most radical student organisation leading massive student strikes); the Socialist Party of Malaysia (hugely involved in the Bersih democracy uprising); and from the brave Palestinian People's Party.

Refugee lawyer David Manne and a pro bono legal team will take the federal government and ASIO to the High Court to challenge the indefinite detention of refugees found to be “security threats”. The case will argue that refugees should be told the full reasons for ASIO's decision, so they are able to appeal adverse findings. Manne said the situation now is “like being sentenced to life imprisonment without even having been charged, tried and convicted. It's a secret trial”.

The Refugee Action Coalition Sydney released the statement below on May 23. * * * Following a report on ASIO negative Tamil refugees, aired on the ABC’s current affairs program, 7:30, on May 21, Serco guards raided and searched the accommodation rooms of ASIO-negative Tamils late Tuesday afternoon.

The Sydney Al-Nakba rally and march - marking 64 years since the brutal dispossession of Palestinians from their homeland - was successful despite police attempts to derail it.

More refugees confronted with a lifetime in immigration detention because of an “adverse” security check by ASIO are being driven to suicide attempts and self-harm.