The government refused to discuss the whereabouts of an asylum seeker boat which came within 200 metres of Christmas Island last week. The group of 16 asylum seekers were found stranded at sea near the town of Tabolong, on the western tip of West Timor, Indonesia. It is not clear whether the passengers on the boat made asylum claims, or whether any claims were assessed on board.
Also in Indonesia, two asylum seekers told an Indonesian court they witnessed Australian authorities paying the crew of their boat a cash payment in June 2015, before escorting them back to Indonesian waters.
An Iranian asylum seeker on Nauru protested to draw attention to the condition of the 95 children in detention on the island. See more statistics at Asylum Insight’s statistics page. Earlier in the week, the Australian Senate passed a bill calling for all children to be released from detention.
Germany will begin to deport asylum seekers from the Western Balkans whose applications for asylum have been unsuccessful. Balkan countries have imposed stricter border controls, allowing only Syrian, Iraqi and Afghan asylum seekers to pass through from Greece. The controls have been met with violent protests from asylum seekers on the Greek side of the border. The UN has warned of humanitarian problems as restrictions chiefly involve people being profiled on the basis of their alleged nationalities
Read the Kaldor Centre weekly news roundup.