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| Australia's Prime Minister Julia Gillard addresses the Lowy Institute in Sydney July 6, 2010. Australia's new prime minister announces plans to send boat people to East Timor to have their refugee claims assessed, in a policy shift aimed at defusing a politically and racially charged debate at home ahead of looming elections. [AP] |
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Prime Minister Julia Gillard unveiled her strategy for tackling one of the country’s most divisive issues on Tuesday with a sweeping plan to establish a regional center for processing boat people aiming for refuge in Australia.
In her first policy speech as prime minister, Ms. Gillard announced plans to create a regional hub for processing refugees on the island nation of East Timor as a means of deterring thousands of mainly Sri Lankan and Afghan asylum seekers from paying criminal syndicates for passage to Australia in the hope of gaining residency.
"A regional processing center removes the incentive, once and for all, for the people smugglers to send boats to Australia,” Ms. Gillard told the Lowy Institute for International Policy here. “Why risk a dangerous journey if you will simply be returned to the regional processing center?”
She gave few details, but said she had discussed her proposal with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and leaders of East Timor and New Zealand. East Timor’s deputy prime minister, José Luís Guterres, said on an Australian radio broadcast that his government was considering the request and would make a decision in the coming weeks. But he expressed some concern that the impoverished country already had “many issues” to resolve without the extra burden of a regional refugee camp.
Refugee advocates were also cautiously supportive of the idea, provided that it had the support of the United Nations and that it was carried out humanely. The United Nations refugee agency, which has criticized Australia’s asylum policies in the past, said it was too early to comment on Ms. Gillard’s proposal.
Although boat arrivals account for just 1.5 percent of Australia’s 190,000 new immigrants each year, the issue has long been a contentious one, stirring Australians’ anxieties over immigration.
For most of the past decade, Australia has had one of the toughest asylum programs in the developed world, placing “irregular maritime arrivals” in isolated detention centers, surrounded by electrified razor-wire fences while their claims are assessed.
With boat arrivals now at five-year highs, many of those centers are operating beyond capacity, and the issue has regained political prominence.
The conservative opposition Liberal Party has argued repeatedly that the government has made Australia more attractive to boat people by unwinding many of the policies enacted by John Howard when he was prime minister. Those policies include denying asylum seekers permanent residency and the right to be reunited with family members, as well as charging refugees for the cost of their detention.
