Oz PM blasts Amnesty’s claim of abuse at immigration centres

Published: October 18, 2016, 12:04 pm

    Australia’s tough immigration policy came under scrutiny on Tuesday for alleged “human rights abuses”, but Australian Prime Minister rejected the claims as “absolutely false”.

    Under its policy, the Australian government blocks asylum seekers arriving by sea from being resettled in Australia.

    Amnesty International maintains that treatment of asylum seekers on the Pacific island of Nauru, one of two offshore processing centers, amounted to “torture” and a “systematic regime of neglect and cruelty”.

    Some 400 men, women and children are currently held the Nauru facility, in use since 2013 to house asylum seekers intercepted at sea. Amnesty says the prison-like conditions in the detention facility were driving asylum seekers to “absolute despair” with an “epidemic of self-harm”.

    But Australian Prime Minister Turnbull blasted the claims made by Amnesty on Tuesday: “I reject that claim totally. It is absolutely false.

    “As far as Nauru is concerned … there is a very substantial investment there, to improve the circumstances of the people that are there.” But Turnbull also called his government’s commitment to protecting its borders as “compassionate and strong”.

    “What we’ve been able to do is to stop the boats, no deaths at sea. We have reduced children in detention from almost 2000 when we came into office (in 2013) to zero.”

    But AI insisted that Turnbull’s claims are “technically not true” since deaths continue to occur in international waters, just not near Australia.

    The Nauru Government called the charges fabricated. “It was clear these children were coached,” the government said in a statement, saying that an ABC report on the AI accusations amounted to “biased political propaganda and lies” and “an insult to the people of Nauru”.

    The United Nations launched its own fresh attack of Australia’s immigration policies by denouncing its “human rights record” on Tuesday.

    Australian detention center employees are discouraged to speak to press directly, the UN says, curtailing their “freedom of speech”.

    karin@praag.org

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