The Refugee Action Coalition has welcomed the government\u2019s announcement to immediately increase Australia\u2019s refugee intake to 20,000. But the government could and should have increased the intake without re-opening Nauru.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe bitter pill of violating refugee rights on Nauru is not going to be sweetened by increasing Australia\u2019s overall intake,\u201d said Ian Rintoul, spokesperson for the Refugee Action Coalition.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe increase to 20,000 places is welcome, if long overdue. Even with the increase, the refugee intake is still lower as a proportion of refugees to population than it was in the early 1990s, before the Howard government cut it in half.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are many details still to be announced. And the Expert Panel recommended that 3,800 of the extra places should go to refugees waiting within the region. So taking only an extra 400 refugees from Indonesia is only a small start\u2013 and they need to know now, when they will be coming to Australia,\u201d said Ian Rintoul.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne crucial issue is timely processing and resettlement. The four hundred recognised UNHCR refugees in Indonesia should be brought to Australia immediately.<\/p>\n
\u201cTwenty-seven Tamil refugees who were told in January that they had been accepted by Australia, are still waiting to be resettled seven months later.<\/p>\n
\u201cOnly one family has even had a resettlement interview. There are around 80 of the Merak Tamils promised resettlement by the Rudd government in 2009 still waiting in Medan. If the government expects its announcement to have any impact, they can\u2019t make the refugees in Indonesia wait another month let alone another year.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese are the kinds of delays and broken promises that push asylum seekers and refugees onto boats.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe announcement also exposes the contradictions and hypocrisy in the government\u2019s new Pacific Solution. Under the Pacific Solution, Sri Lankan asylum seekers who arrive at Cocos Island are liable to be sent to Nauru. But Sri Lankan refugees who have to make longer boat trips to travel to Malaysia or Indonesia will be a resettlement priority.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf the government was truly concerned to save lives at sea, it would not be making Tamil refugees travel further by boat. The boats should be welcome in Australia.\u201d<\/p>\n
For more information contact Ian Rintoul 0417 275 713<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Refugee Action Coalition has welcomed the government\u2019s announcement to immediately increase Australia\u2019s refugee intake to 20,000. But the government could and should have increased the intake without re-opening Nauru. \u201cThe bitter pill of violating refugee rights on Nauru is not going to be sweetened by increasing Australia\u2019s overall intake,\u201d said Ian Rintoul, spokesperson for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":311091,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1933","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-press-releases"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/refugeeaction.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1933","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/refugeeaction.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/refugeeaction.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/refugeeaction.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/311091"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/refugeeaction.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1933"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/refugeeaction.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1933\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/refugeeaction.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1933"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/refugeeaction.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1933"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/refugeeaction.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1933"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}