Australia urged to reverse refugee policy and end detention

Transcript

A new report from Human Rights Watch says Australia continues to intentionally ignore appalling human rights abuses against men, women and children being held in detention on Nauru.

The investigative report says Australia's off-shore detention policy has resulted in deliberate abuse of asylum seekers which has been hidden behind a wall of secrecy.

Human Rights Watch's senior counsel Michael Bochenek managed to visit Nauru last month as part of the investigation which collected accounts from 84 refugees and asylum seekers from Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, Somalia, Bangladesh, Kuwait  and Afghanistan.

Mr Bochenek says substandard housing and health conditions on Nauru for refugees, coupled with hostility from the local population and an uncertain future, is causing serious damage to the mental and physical well being of refugees and asylum seekers.

MICHAEL BOCHENEK: Nearly everybody spoke of verbal harrasments, of being spit upon. We also heard reports of frequent cursing of people, swearing at people, people described having objects thrown at them like bottles. being swerved at as they walked along the side of the road. Being attacked with pipes with branches, with fists, by individuals or by groups of people and having their property destroyed. Having individuals or groups stand outside these accommodation areas, the newer camps for refugees and with a lot of noise and in some cases destruction of property and injury to people. These are, these were common reports and furthermore they told us that police whenever they did call the police would sometimes refuse to take the report and would in most cases do nothing in response. Those kinds of accounts that we heard are borne out by the testimony of for example the former chief justice of Nauru an Australian lawyer who testified before an Australian human rights commission and said essentially that the Nauruan police are very very unlikely to follow up on complaints of assault by Nauruans against refugees and asylum seekers.

KOROI HAWKINS: Yes and this dislike or this hatred towards refugees, I spoke with a Nauruan government official a few months back and he was talking about how from his perspective they felt that the refugees where more privileged given all the money that was coming from Australia to support them and set them up and there is that resentment that Nauruans were the worse off in the arrangement. Did you get a sense of that, is that at all what you were hearing from the Nauruan people maybe that you spoke to?

MB: Certainly from the Nauruans I spoke to there is a bit of that and you can understand how they might feel that way. There is a lot of money coming in from Australia from the Australian government which most governments are not seeing. There is money flowing certainly to the Nauruan government and flowing to specific individuals. But by and large what they are really seeing is a lot of Australian hired, Australian service providers, security guards, medical staff, counsellors and so on coming in and flying out. And then they also see that refugees who are housed in community arrangements in the camps outside the tent area, outside the former detention centre are in their minds getting new housing. Although quite small and inadequate in the longer term. Are getting a food allowance, are getting things that to local Nauruans looks like a lot of money. And I think it is difficult from their perspective to appreciate that these are people that never intended to be on Nauru. They were taken there forcibly by Australia and the Australian government is responsible for their well-being. They were Australia chose a place that is inadequate in most respects. Safety, medical care, the conditions of living for the first two, year and a half or two years with dire consequences for mental health. This is a population that already have suffered trauma and then was forcibly relocated and effectively banished to an island four and a half hours by plane away from anything.

KH: Such a complicated and depressing situation, is there any way that this can be resolved?

MB: Well the clearest way for it to be resolved is for Australia to reverse its policy. That involves closing down both off-shore operations on Nauru as well as on Manus Island and relocating people to Australia in the first instance. The human cost is apparent and it is astounding with any time on Nauru. Everybody spoke to us about serious mental health conditions, serious mental health concerns that had started as a result of their time on Nauru. So people described extreme anxiety sleeplessness parents developing conditions that seem a lot like paranoia. They talk about wanting to injure themselves, actually injuring themselves. Thinking of killing themselves and in many cases of course attempting and succeeding in doing so. They speak of children who have nightmares who began to wet their bed who begin to stop interacting with other kids, stop playing, stop leaving the house, stop even talking. And these are all indications of a serious set of concerns for peoples mental well-being that has a lot to do, that has everything to do with the context in which they have been held the treatment that they have received and their prospects for the future.