HOMOPHOBIA, XENOPHOBIA, HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSES, APARTHEID - AUSTRALIA'S POLITICIANS AND THE PEOPLE WHO ELECT THEM

Gay refugees on Nauru 'prisoners' in their home as Australia prepares to celebrate Mardi Gras

March 5, 2016 

Nicole Hasham

Environment and immigration correspondent

EXCLUSIVE

Injuries the men say they have suffered on the island nation. Photo: Supplied
 
Two gay refugees who fell in love at the Nauru detention camp say they are virtually prisoners in their home: holed up in fear for their lives after being bashed and verbally abused in a nation where homosexuality is illegal
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As Sydney prepares for Saturday night's Mardi Gras parade - an event that showcases Australia as a global model of acceptance of gay and lesbian people - the federal government is refusing to rescue the two young Iranian men it sent to a country where they could be jailed for their sexual orientation, according to lawyers.
Immigration Minister Peter Dutton has so far refused to help the refugees, who say they have been repeatedly beaten, had rocks thrown at them and been called "human rubbish". His department says refugees at Nauru can accept resettlement in Cambodia.

A digitally altered photo of two gay Iranian refugees, Nima and Ashkan, who say they are being persecuted at Nauru, where homosexuality is illegal. Photo: supplied
 
The Human Rights Law Centre and international LGBT rights group All Out have begun a petition calling on Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull to urgently intervene and bring the men to Australia. The refugees, known by the pseudonyms Nima and Ashkan, live in the Nauruan community. They say they spend their lives confined in a tiny unit with the doors locked and window shades drawn - leaving just once a week to buy food, escorted by a case manager.

"We would love to live in a country where we can love each other without any barriers … and Australia is such a country," Nima told Fairfax Media through an interpreter, speaking on the phone from Nauru.
"Most of the time we just lie on the bed because we can't do anything … we are mentally suffering. We can't do anything else."

Further injuries the men have endured. Photo: Supplied
 
The men, both in their 20s, fled Iran separately after suffering persecution and headed to Australia. They met after being transferred to the Nauru detention camp and their relationship began about two years ago.

They claim to have suffered harassment from other detainees while inside the centre. After being found to be refugees and moved into the Nauruan community, they say the attacks escalated.

In one alleged assault one evening in July last year, the men were walking home carrying their shopping when their path was blocked by three local men.

The refugees allege the men asked if they were partners, which they confirmed, before the men said "f*ck you" and beat them with sticks, forcing them to the ground.

The refugees said they sustained bruising and were taken to hospital. Ashkan allegedly suffered concussion and was kept overnight

In an attack the following month, Nima was allegedly punched in the head by two men on motorbikes, who yelled "you f***ing gays".

A spokesman for the Department of Immigration and Border Protection said it was "aware of an incident involving the individuals" and law enforcement in Nauru was the responsibility of the island's government.
The spokesman said concerns about the treatment of gay people are considered prior to a detainee's transfer to that country.

"It is not Australian government policy for illegal maritime arrivals to settle in Australia. Refugees in Nauru may apply to Cambodia for permanent settlement," he said.

Very few refugees have taken up the Cambodia resettlement option. Critics say that nation has been accused of human rights abuses, has high poverty levels and no refugee resettlement experience.

The Nauruan government had not provided comment at the time of writing.

HRLC's director of advocacy and litigation, Anna Brown, said under Nauruan law Ashkan and Nima risk being jailed for up to 14 years.

"This situation and similar ones on Manus [Island] are just so wrong ... the Australian government knowingly and deliberately allows gay men to be warehoused on tiny islands where they face assaults, prejudice and extremely harsh criminal penalties," she said.

The HRLC says former human rights commissioner Tim Wilson was notified of the case and raised it with the government. Mr Wilson, who recently resigned the post to launch a bid for Parliament with the Liberal Party, would not comment.

A spokesman for Connect Settlement Services, which assists refugees at Nauru, said it was aware of assault allegations "made by clients in June and July last year and we have provided assistance to those clients".

 

ASYLUM SEEKERS, AUSTRALIANS, AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENTS, MEDIA, XENOPHOBIA, HYPOCRISY!

Australia's population, most of whom have their origins as boat people, have become some of the most xenophobic societies in the world, and that is no exaggeration!

Xenophobia is defined as "a deep dislike of foreigners". So people in Australia are not just xenophobes but also racists.

Racism is defined as "a belief in the superiority of a particular race: prejudice based on this", "antagonism towards other races, especially as a result of this".

What is race?  Race is defined as "each of the major divisions of humankind, having distinct physical characteristics."

The people who landed in Australia in 1788 were colonisers from Britain and they found people living in Australia who were dark-skinned, who looked and sounded different from themselves, and behaved differently as well. So a form of racism originated and has intensified over the years.

Australians behave towards the indigenous population in 2014 in the same way as white South Africans behaved towards the indigenous South African populations from 1652, when the first colonists arrived, to 1994, when officially, the apartheid government of white South Africa came to an end.

Tony Abbott and previous prime ministers have "declared war" on people having the cheek to try and get out of their countries which have been destroyed by Australia making war in those countries, rendering them and some of their inhabitants' places of residence unliveable.

However, they have joined the ranks of the "untermenschen" from the Third Reich's attack on Europe's populations in the 1930s and 1940s.

The media in Australia have helped respective governments to demonise people seeking asylum by expressions such as "illegal immigrants" and other choice phrases.

Much more along these lines and we will turn into a police state - and then enter the dark waters of fascism - it doesn't take much from one step to another when we use "war" terminology for our actions in relation to people who are demonised at every turn and when governments refuse to tell the population what is actually going on. The previous government was well on the way too, by sending asylum seekers to remote countries to be locked in concentration camps and then refusing to give any information and not allowing the media - pathetic as they are anyway  - to enter and report on their findings, particularly after reports of abuse by the people running the concentration camps managed to leak their way out.

TEN YEARS ON FROM THE TAMPA - REFUGEES DENIED FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS

2 JANUARY 2012

The following article was published in the University of Western Sydney's GradLife alumni journal - Volume 3 Issue 2 November 2011. It is an article of such importance as to merit publishing it in as many places as possible to give the matter as much publicity as possible:

Opinion piece:

ten years on from the Tampa - refugees denied fundamental rights

UWS Law School Professor Michael Head reviews the controversial Malaysia Solution.

Inflated claims have been made by some lawyers about the August 31 High Court ruling on the refugee 'Malaysian Solution' - such as that the court has become a 'people's court' and a de facto court of human rights.

In reality, the court's decision was an extremely narrow one. It leaves in place the system of 'onshore' detention within Australia - a system that denies fundamental legal and democratic rights to asylum seekers, such as to seek political protection without being penalised, and not to be detained without trial.

It should be recalled that in 2001, the High Court permitted the forced removal of the Tampa refugees to Nauru, and in 2004 the court ruled that the government could keep refugees detained within onshore Australian detention centres indefinitely, even in violation of international law, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

The latest High Court decision was based on an interpretation of specific sections of the Migration Act and the Immigration (Guardianship of Children) Act.

In particular, section 198A(3) of the Migration Act was interpreted to reflect obligations under the international Refugee Convention. These obligations are minimal: not to deport someone who is officially classified as a refugee to face political persecution and not to punish people making protection applications.

As several judges made clear, the ruling does not prohibit other versions of so-called offshore processing, as long as they satisfy these very limited requirements.

The High Court decision leaves intact mandatory detention, that is, the imprisonment of all asylum seekers arriving in boats - a punitive regime that, in effect, violates the Refugee Convention by seeking to deter refugees from exercising their right to seek asylum. Australia is the only country to maintain such compulsory detention, which was first introduced by a Labor government in the 1990s.

Much of the commentary surrounding the court's ruling was guided by the conception that detention is acceptable as long as the Australian government remains in control of the process. This standpoint ignores the fact that the treatment of asylum seekers in Australian facilities is punitive and degrading, and has caused immense personal suffering.

Across Australia's detention network, incidents of self harm, most often through attempted suicide or mass hunger strikes, have escalated. According to statistics obtained by the Ombudsman from the Immigration Department, there were 1132 instances of actual or threatened self-harm in 12 months - an average of three per day. In just one week during July, there were 50 such incidents.

In line with the reaction of successive governments to any challenge by incarcerated refugees to the denial of their fundamental rights, the federal government has responded with repression, including the use of tear gas and rubber bullets. Desperate protests by inmates, attempting to draw public attention to their plight, have been met with the arbitrary removal of demonstrators to high-security prisons and threats by government ministers to retaliate by stripping refugees of their right to seek asylum.

The experience of the past two decades suggests that the conditions inside the detention centres will only worsen as asylum seekers wait longer and longer for decisions on their visa applications. The High Court late last year held that detainees on Christmas Island could not be denied access to the courts. Given the numbers of detainees and the lengthy nature of the official and judicial processes, however, many are likely to remain imprisoned, waiting months, if not years, for appeal outcomes.

The government's move to circumvent the latest ruling reveals a contempt for basic legal norms. Its draft legislation effectively repudiated the requirements of the Refugee Convention, placed all power in the personal hands of the immigration minister to declare any country an 'offshore processing country' in the 'national interest' and precluded any overriding vote by parliament.

More fundamentally, the entire political establishment, including the Greens, advocate some form of 'border protection' regime, which ultimately means using military force, in one way or another, either to physically 'turn back the boats' or to otherwise block refugees. Intrinsically, it denies the right to flee persecution and seek asylum, which means nothing if countries shut their borders.

Political and media commentators generally attribute this policy to widespread public hostility to refugees. An interesting opinion poll conducted by Fairfax Media, however, found just 25 percent support for 'offshore processing'.

To the extent that anti-refugee sentiment exists among certain layers of the population, it is largely the result of political and media campaigns aimed at fomenting xenophobic fears about the country being 'under siege' or facing 'invasion' by hordes of aliens responsible for driving 'Australians' out of jobs, lowering their wages and cutting their living standards. Such rhetoric has always been used in times of economic crisis to deflect domestic discontent away from the real culprits - the political and ruling elite and the profit system itself.

Not only the right to asylum but a more basic democratic principle is at stake in this issue: that all people should have the elementary right to live and work with full citizenship rights in any country of their choosing. Without that fundamental right they can be denuded of virtually any other civil and political right.