Documents tabled in parliament on Monday show that when then-minister Peter Dutton was sent a briefing note about the audit, he simply indicated he had “noted” the report without having a discussion about it with his department.
Editorial : Detention Disgrace. The Saturday Paper
For as long as the camps were running, nothing else mattered. Regimes were propped up. Corrupt businessmen were paid. The rule of law was debased. Countries were left to teeter into bankruptcy.
This was Australia’s calculation: whatever happens in Papua New Guinea or Nauru is fine, so long as they continue to keep our secrets, so long as they agree to keep storing our refugees.
Both countries became less democratic in the time they ran Australia’s detention centres. Both saw corruption flourish and mismanagement go unchecked. Australia knew this and did nothing. In some cases, the government encouraged it.
It is in this context that Papua New Guinea’s prime minister, James Marape, addressed Australia’s parliament this week. He is the first Pacific leader to do so.
“These have all been our challenges, but as I visit you today, I ask you – do not give up on Papua New Guinea,” he said.
Drugs, guns, corruption, Australia paid suspect companies to run offshore detention. By Nick McKenzie, Michael Bachelard and Amelia Ballinger, SMH
Much of the questionable contracting happened when now Opposition Leader Peter Dutton was responsible for the Department of Home Affairs, although Richardson laid blame with senior public servants and said he found no evidence of ministerial involvement in suspect contracting.
Richardson said blame for the failures he uncovered lay with “senior people within Home Affairs” who were “responsible [for ensuring] proper communication across the department”.
Pope Francis would find PNG refugee conditions an eye-opener By Mark Gaetani, P&I →
In December, an impressive young Papua New Guinean named Jason Siwat, the director of the refugee program for the Catholic Bishops Conference of PNG and the Solomon Islands, travelled to Canberra bearing two important documents.
The first was a letter from the bishops to Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil asking the government to urgently bring to Australia a group of refugees, now 57 following some acceptances by New Zealand, who been taken to the capital of Port Moresby from the Australian-run Manus Island detention facility in late 2021……………………………………
………..The second document Mr Siwat carried was a survey of the living conditions of several hundred refugees and asylum seekers from the Indonesian province of West Papua, formerly Irian Jaya.
Pope Francis would find PNG refugee conditions an eye-opener. By Mark Gaetani, P&I
PNG Prime Minister Marape's Australia visit must prompt repatriation talks for former Manus Island detainees. Amnesty International
Amnesty International Australia calls on the Australian government to use Prime Minister James Marape’s visit to Canberra to offer repatriation to the 55 remaining men who sought asylum in Australia, were then detained on Manus Island as part of Australia’s offshore detention regime and now remain in Papua New Guinea.
Watchdog lambasts Australian Border Force and home affairs deportation procedures. By Sarah Basford Canales & Paul Karp, The Guardian
In a report released on Wednesday, the government watchdog lambasted the government agencies for having policies and procedures that contained “little acknowledgment” of the effect each day spent detained can have on a person’s physical and mental health.
AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENT PLEDGES AT THE 2023 GLOBAL REFUGEE FORUM - Refugee Council of Australia
At each Global Refugee Forum (GRF), governments, civil society organisations and others are invited to make pledges on additional concrete actions they will take over the coming four years to support refugee self-reliance, ease pressure on host countries and contribute to durable solutions.
The Australian Government has made 23 pledges at the 2023 Global Refugee Forum on matters relating to resettlement, community sponsorship, refugee labour mobility, education, mental health, immigration detention, refugee participation, gender, refugee travel documents, statelessness, international cooperation, peacebuilding, the needs of Rohingya refugees and displacement in and from Afghanistan and Sudan.
AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENT PLEDGES AT THE 2023 GLOBAL REFUGEE FORUM - Refugee Council of Australia
UNICEF chief understands donors need to feel comfortable before resuming aid to UNRWA. By Sarah Ferguson & Marina Freri, 7:30 ABC .
UNICEF's executive director Catherine Russell says she understands the concerns of donor countries including Australia who have suspended aid to the UN's refugee agency in Gaza, following allegations of staff involvement in the October 7 terrorist attacks in Israel.
Immigration detainees drop High Court challenges after ankle monitoring bracelets removed. By Matthew Doran, ABC News
People released from immigration detention in the wake of a High Court ruling were made to wear ankle monitoring devices, but some have been removed after legal challenges.
Millions allegedly misspent or wasted in Australia’s offshore detention system, senior Home Affairs official tells tribunal. Josh Taylor, The Guardian
In July last year, the federal government appointed Dennis Richardson, a former secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and the Department of Defence, to undertake a review of procurement for offshore processing in the Department of Home Affairs. That followed revelations the former government continued to pay millions of taxpayer dollars to a businessman convicted of corruption to provide offshore processing services on Nauru, even after he had pleaded guilty to bribing Nauruan government officials.
Time running out for Albanese Government to fix asylum system. By Abul Rizvi, P & I
Despite its $160 million package to better manage asylum seekers, time is running out for the Albanese Government to get on top of the asylum seeker issue. The risk of this being used by Peter Dutton in the lead up to the 2025 Election as a political wedge, despite Dutton’s role in originally allowing the problem to boom, remains high.
Time running out for Albanese Government to fix asylum system. By Abul Rizvi, P &I
Sovereign Borders wasted and mismanaged millions, claims senior official. By Nick McKenzie and Michael Bachelard, SMH
Home Affairs assistant secretary Derek Elias’ claims that taxpayer funds may have been spent on services that were never delivered and on questionable tasks – such as training the Nauruan president’s guard dog and $6 million for golf umbrellas – have emerged with the Albanese government yet to release what is expected to be a damning report on offshore processing by former spy chief Dennis Richardson.
Australia's population has hit 27 million. How did we get here? AAP, SBS
The estimate of 27 million is based on the nation's population on 30 June 2023, which was 26,638,544 people, and projected growth that includes a birth every one minute and 42 seconds.
It also assumes that a person dies every two minutes and 52 seconds and a migrant arrives to live in Australia every 45 seconds. These factors contributed to an overall total population increase of one person every 50 seconds.
Australia's population has hit 27 million. How did we get here? AAP, SBS
A symbol of millions of children’: Little Amal to bring her giant campaign to Adelaide festival. By Kelly Burke, The Guardian
The 3.5-metre high puppet highlights the plight of millions of refugees, especially displaced children fleeing war zones.
The whistleblower who exposed Australia’s secretive offshore detention system. 'Background Briefing', ABC RN, Paul Farrell & Maddison Conaughton
"Simone" arrived on a remote island to help asylum seekers.
But she witnessed something there that convinced her to leak over 2000 documents.
Top French court rejects large parts of controversial immigration bill. Aljazeera
More than a third of articles in a controversial immigration bill must be scrapped, France’s Constitutional Council has said.
The council, a body that validates the constitutionality of laws, rejected measures in the bill on Thursday that call for the toughening of access to social benefits, family reunification, and the introduction of immigration quotas set by parliament.
Top French court rejects large parts of controversial immigration bill. Aljazeera
UNHCR: 569 Rohingya died at sea in 2023, highest in nine years. Aljazeera
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said nearly 4,500 Rohingya people took boats across the Andaman Sea and Bay of Bengal in 2023, fleeing crowded refugee camps in Bangladesh or persecution in their native Myanmar.
“Estimates show one Rohingya was reported to have died or gone missing for every eight people attempting the journey in 2023,” UNHCR spokesperson Matthew Saltmarsh said in a statement. “This makes the Andaman Sea and Bay of Bengal one of the deadliest stretches of water in the world.”
UNHCR: 569 Rohingya died at sea in 2023, highest in nine years. Aljazeera
Tide turning on boat people bastardry. By Jack Waterford, P&I
The tide is turning for our boat people policies, and Australia’s shameful treatment of several thousand men, women and children fleeing war and oppression, some of it created by us, in the Middle East and Afghanistan. The overwhelming proportion were found to be genuine refugees, but, thanks to our policies, successive Australian governments, starting with the second Rudd government, tried to prevent them ever getting any right to live in Australia. Instead these people were placed in concentration camps on Nauru and Manus Island, and treated with conscious and deliberate cruelty as a way of sending a message to other asylum seekers that there was no point in trying to enter Australia by boat.
Many of those, including children, who suffered long term harm from their incarceration are now suing the Australian government. Not surprisingly, the Commonwealth has been trying to deflect blame for failing to meet its legal and moral responsibilities onto others.
Tide turning on boat people bastardry. By Jack Waterford, P&I
Child among asylum seekers returned to country of origin after being sent from Australia to Nauru.by Paul Karp, The Guardian
Ogy Simic, the director of advocacy at the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre, said the organisation was “deeply concerned by the complete lack of transparency and information provided to the Australian public” about the cohorts transferred to Nauru in September and November.
Simic said the answers give “no information” about where the eight asylum seekers returned to “and what process was followed”.
“It was also incredibly distressing to find out that the initial group transferred to Nauru included a child. The government’s refusal to answer questions about the activity on Nauru flies in the face of its own calls for greater transparency when in opposition.”
Woman arrested over alleged PNG drug smuggling plot linked to companies that reportedly received Australian refugee fund payments. By PNG correspondents Tim Swanston & Rory Callinan, ABC News
The ABC is aware of two other companies that had associations with Ms Lin and were reported by sources to have been involved in providing services to refugees.
One company appears to have been involved in providing security services, according to sources.
A Home Affairs spokesperson on Monday said Home Affairs hadn't had any role in service delivery in PNG since 2021.
Home Affairs was not aware of, or involved in, PNG's contracting arrangements associated with its independent management of the remaining cohort, the spokesperson said.
The spokesperson said Australia had exited regional processing arrangements in PNG in December 2021 and agreed to a funding arrangement with PNG for its exclusive independent management of individuals remaining in the country after December 31, 2021.
"That arrangement provided funding to enable PNG Immigration and Citizenship Services Authority to manage individuals remaining in PNG to self-sufficiency, including settling individuals who chose to make PNG their new home or those seeking third country migration,'' the spokesperson said.