With an asylum seeker boat carrying 88 people arriving hours in the wake of last weekend’s election victory, Prime Minister-elect Tony Abbott is going about shaping the architecture of the Coalition government’s hardline asylum policy, Operation Sovereign Borders.
Two reporters arrived on Christmas Island after three days at sea on an asylum seeker boat. After speaking with the Australian Federal Police, the pair were processed and free to go. In closed detention, a group of Vietnamese asylum seekers staged a 24-hour hunger strike.
ASIO is reviewing the adverse security assessments of four refugees held in indefinite detention on the advice of independent reviewer Margaret Stone. Outgoing Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus urged the Coalition to reconsider its election promise to abolish the review.
Internationally, Tony Abbott began talks with the Papua New Guinea government, hoping to maintain the arrangements that the Labor government put in place. Indonesia foreign minister Marty Natalegawa rejected the Coalition’s asylum policies ahead of Mr Abbott’s visit to Jakarta.