An International Criminal Court (ICC) investigation has found that the Australian offshore processing regime may have breached international law but there is not enough evidence to prosecute on grounds of crimes against humanity. While ‘cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment’ of asylum seekers was found, this varied over time, and was not done with the purpose of ‘attack’ or on discriminatory grounds, said the ICC. However, it noted that ‘the gravity of the alleged conduct thus appears to have been such that it was in violation of fundamental rules of international law’, but this is not within the jurisdiction of the ICC. Independent member Andrew Wilkie MP has been raising these issues with the ICC for 5 years and brought the case for crimes against humanity to the ICC. He regarded the report as vindication of the complaint, being a ‘remarkable condemnation’ of the policy.
The Australian OPCAT Network laid out concerns about ‘cruel and arbitrary treatment’ in Australia’s immigration detention system. The report is to the UN Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture (SPT) and the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention (WGAD), ahead of their visits to Australia in 2020. Australia ratified the Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (OPCAT) in December 2017.
Further delays are likely in hearing the trauma compensation claims made by 63 people who were asylum seekers held at either Baxter or Woomera detentions centres after 2000. The Commonwealth government appealed to the High Court against a South Australian court decision to allow the lead claimant to re-file his 2012 claim with new evidence about the alleged mistreatment. The claims, mainly of de-humanising treatment causing ongoing psychological problems, are now unlikely to be resolved for another five years, say legal sources. In 2017, the Commonwealth paid $70 million to settle a class action taken on behalf of 1900 asylum seekers held on Manus Island between 2012 and 2016.
Tamils living in India have said are saying that changes to India’s citizenship laws in December last year are discriminatory, and likely to generate departures to countries such as Australia in future. Tamils who have fled Sri Lanka to India are unable to obtain Indian citizenship and restricted in their civil rights. The new Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) offers citizenship to non-Muslims fleeing religious persecution from three nearby countries: Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan. Sri Lanka and Myanmar are not included. The Sri Lankan Navy says irregular migration from Sri Lanka to Australia and New Zealand saw a sharp increase in 2019.
A group of eight young Indonesian fishermen, jailed in Australia as people smugglers ten years ago, have sought are seeking the Federal Court to allow appeals which may quash their convictions. Their claim is that they were as young as 12 years old at the time, but the Australian government wrongly imprisoned, rather than deported, them. West Australian courts accepted wrist x-ray tests which suggested they were older, but the government ignored later advice from the Human Rights Commission that the tests were flawed, and 120 Indonesians were wrongly jailed in adult prisons. The Commission is also considering further complaints that they young men have been victims of racial discrimination.
In a wide-ranging interview with Patricia Karvelas on ABC Radio National, Independent Senator Jacqui Lambie was repeatedly asked about her secret deal with the Australian government on redeployment of offshore detainees. The main comment extracted was that she would like to see all moved to “where they need to go... so they can get on with their lives”, but not those who are security risks.
Journalist Osman Faruqi wrote a reflective article about the use of the Christmas Island detention facility for quarantine of potential coronavirus victims. The protection of “us” is the theme, which he believes that that still means white Australians.