Ponder this fact: One in every 67 people on the planet has been forcibly displaced, a victim of war and political policies imposed by crazed psychopaths, usually old men. That’s the equivalent of Canada’s population - desperately unhappy, homeless humans going mad as they seek escape from intolerable situations rarely of their making. Asylum seekers who arrived in Indonesia after 1 July 2014 hoping to reach Australia are now detained in the Republic, stateless and seemingly unwanted. Under the warped policy, asylum seekers “who arrive by plane are generally not subject to mandatory detention.” Australia does give refugee and humanitarian visas – 20,000 last year – but not to boat asylum seekers without a visa held in Indonesia who came after the cut-off date.
The penalty for being late is to be doomed forever. By Duncan Graham, Pearls & Irritations