Abbott Offers Asylum Seekers $10k To Go Home,One Way To Curb The Problem

[bonnie]

Abbott Offers Asylum Seekers $10k To Go Home

Date

June 21, 2014

EXCLUSIVE

Prime Minister Tony Abbott and Immigration minister Scott Morrison.

Asylum seekers paid off: Prime Minister Tony Abbott and Immigration Minister Scott Morrison. Photo: Andrew Meares

The Abbott government is offering asylum seekers on Manus Island and Nauru detention centres up to $10,000 to abandon their hope of resettlement in Australia and voluntarily return to the country they fled from.

The revelation comes as the High Court on Friday issued a stunning rebuke to the Abbott government's border protection policy, striking down its decision to to refuse to issue permanent protection visas to boat arrivals found to be refugees.

In two unanimous decisions, with implications for thousands of boat arrivals, the court ruled that Immigration Minister Scott Morrison's decision to impose a cap on the number of places in Australia's refugee intake for boat arrivals was invalid.

Money or the box?: asylum seekers are being offered up to $10,000 to leave detention centres on Nauru and Manus Island.

The sudden boost in payments is the latest tactic being used by the Abbott government to cement its hardline stance against asylum seekers who come to Australia without a visa.

In what are dubbed as "return packages", the Coalition has dramatically increased monetary incentives for asylum seekers to return home that range from $3300 to $10,000 based on "individual circumstances", compared with Labor's offering of between $1500 and $2000 last year.

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees on Friday showed Australia's efforts to help alleviate the crisis have stagnated or worsened, with the country sliding backwards in the global rankings, according to some measures.

Australia now ranks 17th in the world to resettle refugees, according to the Refugee Council of Australia.

Asylum seekers who take up the cash offer are transported to the Hideaway Hotel in Port Moresby that is paid for by the International Organisation of Migration before being flown back to their country of origin.

Fairfax Media understands Lebanese asylum seekers are being paid $10,000 if they voluntarily return to Lebanon, while Iranians and Sudanese are being offered $7000, Afghans are being given $4000 and Pakistani, Nepalese and Burmese asylum seekers are receiving $3300.

Immigration Minister Scott Morrison confirmed that 283 people had voluntarily returned home since September 2013.

It is understood the payments, which are administered by the IOM but funded by the Australian Immigration Department, are made once the asylum seeker has returned to their home country.

Mr Morrison said the packages were tailored to each individual case. "The process of voluntary return is conducted in direct partnership with the International Organisation for Migration which has extensive experience in such matters worldwide," a spokesman for Mr Morrison said. "All such returns are voluntary. The IOM does not facilitate involuntary returns," he said.

Yet in a motion before the Senate, the Greens are urging the government to put a moratorium on sending asylum seekers back to Iraq, where a violent uprising continues to swallow the country.

It is not known whether any money has been offered to Iraqi asylum seekers to leave the centres. Only two days before the violent clashes in the north of the country, an Iraqi man on a bridging visa was forced back to Basra, Iraq by the Australian government, it was revealed on Friday.

Human rights groups and advocates are outraged at the incentives being offered, saying Australia should not be paying people to return to the countries that they fled from.

The Australia Director of Human Rights Watch, Elaine Pearson, said Australia was not alone in facing the problem of increasing global migration.

"By making the conditions in Manus and Nauru so awful that people are encouraged to go back to active conflict zones, you are putting them in danger and quite likely, they'll simply have to leave," she said.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/p...l#ixzz35JeY9X1H

[Sojourner]

Australia and Malta are the only nations that do not permit illegal migrants access to the general community. What happens is people from Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan and so forth get on planes and fly to Indonesia and then pay for boat trips in rickety boats, throwing away their identification papers and often pretending to be from somewhere else than where they really are from because they realize that they may not actually be considered to be refugees if it is found that they are wealthy.

This is a very hot button political topic in Australia that lost the Left Wing Labor Government this last election and another in the 1990's.

The incoming Conservative government has changed the law so that if you arrive in this manner and are found to be a genuine refugee that you still cannot get asylum in Australia and you wait in an internment camp until a place is found for you, currently the Australian Government are sending refugees to Cambodia to be resettled.

Australia takes a number of genuine refugees each year via UN programs. Sudanese and Liberian people are amongst those that have been given places here. I know of two churches here in Adelaide, one an Anglican church (Church of England) and the other a Salvation Army church that are full to capacity with new members as a result, many Sudanese and Liberian people are born again Christians that have been persecuted by arabs and are hence refugees and given the places as a result.

Ask away any questions you have and I will try my best to answer how it all works! - Yet I will add again that it is a very politically motivated topic between the extreme right and left of politics here.

[phkrause]

That would be anywhere. If one party is for it the other will be against it. Pretty simple politics, if you ask me!!

[Bravus]

Will kick in one Aussie view on this later.

[Bravus]

I know there are people who post here, or used to, who are much more involved in this issue than I am: hope they'll be willing to comment.

The bottom line is, Australia runs concentration camps. I'm horrified and ashamed about it, but no other word really captures the horror.

One man, Reza Barati, died and a number of others were injured when the detention centre on Manus Island was attacked. There are well supported allegations of people's hands being held to a hot exhaust pipe when they asked for permission to use the toilet on a long sea voyage.

The asylum seekers are mainly ethnic and religious minorities from areas in which Western invasions have destroyed their safety and security. They are in fear for their lives. $10,000 will get them home... where they will face persecution and death for their beliefs.

Australia already takes 200,000 immigrants a year through normal channels. Boat arrivals are a drop in the bucket. Allegations of people throwing away their identification are largely false. People have fled with the clothes they stand up in and felt grateful to be able to escape.

Australia is in breach of its international treaties and commitments.

One shameful part of the story is that, contrary to what PK said above, it's actually been bipartisan: both sides of Australian politics have sought to make hay by 'dog-whistling' xenophobia and prejudice and demonising the asylum seekers. They have called them 'illegals', when it is perfectly legal to seek asylum.

What Australia needs is a leader with the courage and character to stand up and lead the whole community to a more humane approach. Currently all we have are two who will appeal to the lowest common denominator and our basest instincts, and demonise the people who are fleeing the very people who *actually* pose a threat to Australia.