Asylum seekers released from Melbourne detention hotel with no access to support or welfare: The New Daily, Emily Woods

The Refugee Action Collective said most of the men had been given six-month bridging visas with no access to welfare and little support.

“They have been released to a cheap motel, on a long weekend, with almost no support,” the RAC’s Chris Breen said.

“After eight years in detention, they have been traumatised, institutionalised, denied education and the ability to work and gain skills.

“They should be granted permanent visas, compensated, and given full support, not dumped in the community to fend for themselves.”

Asylum seekers released from Melbourne detention hotel with no access to support or welfare: The New Daily, Emily Woods

Nine refugees released from Melbourne’s Park hotel face uncertain future

Nine more refugees who have been detained for several years have been released from Melbourne’s Park hotel, however those freed remain uncertain about whether they will be allowed to permanently live in Australia.

There are understood to be 18 refugees who remain in the Park hotel – where the world No 1 tennis player Novak Djokovic was detained before being deported from Australia in January.

Nine refugees released from Melbourne’s Park hotel face uncertain future

Nauru detention centre operator makes $101m profit – at least $500,000 for each detainee: Ben Doherty & Ben Butler, The Guardian

The Canstruct group, or entities associated with it, have made 11 donations to the Liberal National party in Queensland. The company has previously strenuously denied any link between political donations and the awarding of any contracts.

Canstruct International’s Nauru contract has attracted significant parliamentary interest and repeated questioning in the Senate.

Nauru detention centre operator makes $101m profit – at least $500,000 for each detainee: Ben Doherty & Ben Butler, The Guardian

Refugees from Afghanistan rally at Parliament House to demand permanent residency: By Rayane Tamer, SBS

Demonstrators from across the country have turned up at Parliament House demanding the federal government provide permanent living options for refugees who have fled Afghanistan. 

Hazara refugee Zaki Haidari arrived in Australia in 2012 after fleeing his home country and was granted a temporary protection visa.

Ten years later, he says he has no adequate pathway of permanently resettling in Australia, the country he now considers home.

Refugees from Afghanistan rally at Parliament House to demand permanent residency: By Rayane Tamer, SBS

Refugee who escaped the Taliban and self-immolated on Nauru speaks from Melbourne's Park Hotel: Erin Handley ABC News

The refugee, known as Jamal, described the anguish that led him to a drastic act, setting himself on fire while in detention on the Pacific island of Nauru………………..

His lawyer, Alison Battisson, worked to extract 110 people from Afghanistan when Kabul fell to the Taliban last year. She said that was a simpler process than trying to free her client……..

"He is someone who put himself and his family in danger to assist the coalition's fight against the Taliban.

"He worked to keep the rest of the world safe and in his hour of need, not only did we abandon him, but we sent him to a place that has torture-like conditions ... This is not the Australian way." 

Refugee who escaped the Taliban and self-immolated on Nauru speaks from Melbourne's Park Hotel: Erin Handley ABC News

The Washington Post: Opinion: Djokovic put a spotlight on Australia’s cruel immigration system. Don’t look away. By Behrouz Boochani and Janet Galbraith

…Beyond this, border politics are used to grow a detention industry to benefit big businesses, particularly private security companies. Conservative estimates suggest that more than 12 billion Australian dollars have been spent on this industry, with billions pocketed by private businesses.

The Washington Post: Opinion: Djokovic put a spotlight on Australia’s cruel immigration system. Don’t look away. By Behrouz Boochani and Janet Galbraith

Craig Foster asks Djokovic team to speak out on refugee detention: ABC RN The World Today

The international attention around Australia's handling of the Novak Djokovic case has also shed light on the country's treatment of refugees.

The world's top tennis player was detained for several days in the same building where dozens of refugee men are being held, with no expected release date. Now advocates are pleading with Novak Djokovic to maintain the momentum for their cause.

Craig Foster asks Djokovic team to speak out on refugee detention: ABC RN The World Today

ALJAZEERA: Djokovic row highlights plight of asylum seekers in Australia

Outside Djokovic ‘hotel’, Serbian supporters rub shoulders with refugee advocates………….

Just four kilometres (2.5 miles) from the luxurious city hotels where most of the other players at the Australian Open are staying, the Park Hotel, a grey five-storey building with locked windows in an inner-city suburb, is officially known as an “alternative place of detention”.

Inside on the second floor are around 30 men from several countries who were evacuated for medical treatment in 2020 from Australian detention centres in the impoverished South Pacific island nations Papua New Guinea and Nauru, now trapped in Australia’s hardline immigration system.

ALJAZEERA: Djokovic row highlights plight of asylum seekers in Australia

Afghanistan's minister for women says she fled the country in disguise. By Sally Sara, ABC News

She said that in the days before her eventual departure, Australian forces attempted to help her leave the country. "The military of Australia called me and they really tried to coordinate for my evacuation, but I could not because I was very, very afraid to take the decision to [take] the local taxi," she said.

"The Australian government also called me and they told me to send [them] the list [of staff to] the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. "This was the first international partner who asked for women who worked in government and directly from Ministry of Foreign Affairs."

Afghanistan's minister for women says she fled the country in disguise. By Sally Sara, ABC News

After the Tampa: what happened to hundreds of refugees rejected by Australia. Fran Kelly, ABC Radio National

20 years ago, the Norwegian freighter the Tampa rescued a group of mostly Afghan asylum seekers from a boat sinking in the Indian Ocean between Indonesia and Australia.The Tampa has since become a byword for Australia's harsh refugee policy, but it's also a story of how some of those refugees were welcomed in New Zealand and managed to rebuild their lives there.
Guest: Abbas Nazari, author of 'After the Tampa: From Afghanistan to New Zealand'

After the Tampa: what happened to hundreds of refugees rejected by Australia. Fran Kelly, ABC Radio National

The Tampa affair, 20 years on: the ship that capsized Australia’s refugee policy. By Ben Doherty, The Guardian

Peter Tinley, second-in-command of the SAS that day, would later report he had been briefed for a potentially hostile and dangerous situation. Instead, he said, he found “400-plus ordinary refugees, very hungry, some who needed some medical attention, very scared and uncertain about what was happening [and] a particularly concerned sea captain who just wanted to offload his human cargo and discharge his duty according to international law”.

The Tampa affair, 20 years on: the ship that capsized Australia’s refugee policy. By Ben Doherty, The Guardian

Afghanistan's female athletes find refuge in Australia. By Tracey Holmes, ABC News

By Wednesday morning, Olympian Nikki Dryden, now a human rights lawyer and founder of Lex Athleta, had teamed up with the director of Human Rights for All, Alison Battisson, whose speciality was helping refugees detained in Australia…..

Dryden had worked previously with former Socceroo captain, Craig Foster, who spearheaded an international campaign in 2018-2019 to save former Bahraini footballer, Hakeem al-Araibi, from wrongful detention and almost certain death. They reconnected and Foster set about putting together a political strategy. His immediate access to the highest levels of Australian government, especially the Foreign Minister, Marise Payne, who had been key in saving al-Araibi's life.

Afghanistan's female athletes find refuge in Australia. ByTracey Holmes, ABC News

Shaminda Kanapathi: Australia’s abandoned refugees: nine years of exile in offshore purgatory

I was one of those people who, along with women, men, unaccompanied minors, and families, was sent to PNG and Nauru. I ended up on Manus Island in PNG, where my imprisonment and torture were used to send a message to the others desperately waiting in Indonesia to take the long journey across the sea to seek Australia’s help.

Shaminda Kanapathi: Australia’s abandoned refugees: nine years of exile in offshore purgatory

Photograph of Biloela sisters shows power of an image over words. By Sean Kelly, The Age

One of the most important facts about the photo of Tharnicaa and Kopika is that it is only them. Without an adult in the frame we become, for at least the brief moment that we look, the adult in the equation. We cannot help but feel responsible because this is what adults are in relation to children: responsible for their care. Responsible for the situation in which they find themselves.

And once we have that thought it is possible we will have the next: that we are responsible not only for these children, but for the other children affected by our terrible treatment of asylum seekers. 

Photograph of Biloela sisters shows power of an image over words. By Sean Kelly, The Age