23 May 2014

Re-settlement programme needed for refugees - Nauru MP

3:30 pm on 23 May 2014

A Nauru MP says there are questions over refugees now being released by Australia into the community will fit in and find work in Nauru.

Roland Kun says the programme of bringing Australia's asylum seekers to Nauru for the processing still has merit but rules around it must be clarified.

Mr Kun, who is one of three MPs suspended from Parliament in a dispute with the Government, was commenting after the first few refugees were released.

He says there is a need to ensure the process is sustainable and acceptable to both the community and the refugees.

Mr Kun says a critical area is the opportunity, or lack of it, for refugees to find work.

"That's where the complication lies in that the current Government entered into an agreement of resettlement with Australia, which we have openly opposed from the outset. There is no opportunity as far as I am concerned for re-settlement on the island, only because of the capacity on the island - capacity to absorb the additional population there has to be a resettlement programme."

A suspended Nauru MP, Roland Kun