Immigration minister Peter Dutton reiterated his description of the first tranche of refugees to be transferred from Manus Island to the United States as ‘economic refugees’. On Sydney radio, Dutton claimed that many of those who ended up in the island camps had not come from war-ravaged areas but were instead seeking economic advantage.
US President Trump’s administration will accept 45,000 refugees in the next financial year, down from almost 85,000 in FY2016. Refugee advocates say that this lower limit ignores growing humanitarian crises around the world that are causing people to flee their countries in greater numbers, and represents a departure from US global leadership.
The Rohingya crisis continues as the UN warns of cholera risk. A boat carrying Rohingya refugees to Bangladesh capsized and at least 12 people, most of them children, drowned. The Sydney Morning Herald reports that people smugglers have begun targeting distressed Rohingya Muslims fleeing what the UN describes as a violent campaign of ethnic cleansing in Myanmar.