HR PART 1 Flashcards
Why is it bad that Aust is taking tough approach to refugees/ asylum seekers?
Australia’s tough approach to people arriving by boat to claim asylum comes at a time when the need for refugee protection has never been more urgent.
UNHCR identified
UNHCR identified 691,000 refugees as being in need of resettlement in 2014 despite having access to only 86,000 global resettlement places each year.
At the end of 2012
, there were more than 45.2 million forcibly displaced people and the highest number of new arrivals in one year since 1999.
rapid escalation of the conflict in Syria resulted in?
The rapid escalation of the conflict in Syria resulted in the displacement of people at a rate of 7,000 people per day with
its hardening attitude to asylum attracted
d unwelcome attention and concern from within Australia and from international gatherings observing with alarm Australia’s increasing shift towards deterrence.
The convening of the Expert Panel on Asylum Seekers offered some hope of progress on
the regional cooperation in the Asia-Pacific region that is needed to create safer pathways to protection.
Some of the Expert Panel recommendations raised hopes that Australia would see
regional cooperation as a priority but the Government was seen to embrace and act quickly to implement deterrence policies that recalled the worst aspects of the Howard Government’s Pacific Solution.
Many of us recall the destructive policy environment of more than a decade ago
the consequences for some of the world’s most vulnerable men, women and children who were denied the opportunity to seek asylum in Australia, expelled to small Pacific nations and damaged by the brutality of indefinite mandatory detention
The United Nations Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, as amended by its 1967 Protocol the Refugee Convention):
“a refugee is a person who is outside their own country and is unable or unwilling to return due to a well-founded fear of being persecuted because of their:
• race
• religion
• nationality
• membership of a particular social group or
• political opinion.
Asylum seekers or refugees and migrants have very different experiences and reasons for moving to another country, fleeing their country for their own safety.”
Australian Government has obligations under
various international treaties to ensure that their human rights are respected and protected.
These treaties include the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR)
The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR)
The Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or PunishmeNT (CAT)
The Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC)
As a party to the Refugee Convention, Australia has agreed to
ensure that asylum seekers who meet the definition of a refugee are not sent back to a country where their life or freedom would be threatened. ( non-refoulement.)
Australia also has obligations not to return people who
face a real risk of violation of certain human rights under the ICCPR, the CAT and the CRC, and not to send people to third countries where they would face a real risk of violation of their human rights under these instruments. These obligations also apply to people who have not been found to be refugees.
the Australian Human Rights Commission’s, Asylum seekers, refugees and human rights: Snapshot report (2013) (ASRHRSR) revealed,
there is “a significant gap between Australia’s human rights obligations under international law and the current treatment of asylum seekers and refugees.”
underlying issues in creating impediments for such individuals who request protection
In such tendencies, increased border controls, visa regimes, and substandard conditions of detention centers have posed as underlying issues in creating impediments for such individuals who request protection.
31 January 2014
The average length of time spent in closed immigration detention facilities rises to 226 days, the highest level in more than two years.
3 February 2014
The Australian Human Rights Commission announces that it will conduct an inquiry into children in immigration detention, to investigate the ways in which life in closed immigration detention facilities affects the health, wellbeing and development of children. The inquiry coincides with the ten-year anniversary of the Commission’s landmark report, A Last Resort? At the time of the announcement, more than 1,000 children are detained in closed facilities
Manus riots illustrate a failure of Australia’s refugee protection
: the recent riots on Manus Island that led to the death of one asylum seeker and injuries to more than 70 others highlight the failure of Australia’s current response to refugees. That one more person has died trying to find safety in Australia is a tragedy that we must learn from to ensure a better situation for asylum seekers and refugees.Yet what has happened on Manus Island highlights that Australia cannot avoid its protection obligations towards asylum seekers, irrespective of any number of commercial in-confidence agreements and bilateral partnerships.
18 October 2013
Temporary Protection Visas (TPVs) are reintroduced. TPVs allow their holders to stay in Australia for up to three years, after which time their protection claims will be reassessed.
26 November 2013
UNHCR reports on conditions in the offshore processing facilities in Nauru and Manus Island find that men, women and children continue to be held in arbitrary indefinite detention and conditions in both sites remain below international standards. Of particular concern is the finding that, since the facilities re-opened in 2012, only one claim for refugee status had been fully processed in Nauru and none had been fully processed in Manus Island.
11 December 2013
mnesty International Australia releases a report of its visit to the offshore processing facility in Manus Island. Entitled This is Breaking People, the report asserts that offshore processing in Papua New Guinea “has resulted in a host of human rights violations” and recommends that the Manus Island facility be closed and all asylum seekers be transferred back to Australia to have their claims processed.
