Questions over refugee resettlement efforts in PNG

Transcript

Refugee advocates and a local MP have disputed the Papua New Guinea government's claims about resettlement of refugees held on Manus Island.

Manus is hosting asylum seekers who had attempted to reach Australia since 2013 before being intercepted by its naval forces and transferred to Manus for offshore processing.

PNG's government says more than half of the over 900 asylum seekers at the Manus centre - who fled from places such as Iran, Afghanistan and Sri Lanka - have now had their refugee status confirmed by PNG Immigration.

Johnny Blades reports.

PNG's Foreign Minister this month confirmed that 472 of the people on Manus have been determined to be refugees.  In Rimbink Pato's words, they were now "free to depart from the processing centre and commence settling in PNG".  However, Ian Rintoul of the Refugee Action Coalition claims this statement is not accurate.

IAN RINTOUL:  There is no resettlement programme in PNG.  The PNG government continues to make these kind of statements from time to time, usually under some pressure from the Australian government.  The fact is there is no resettlement programme in PNG and it's been made very clear that people can't resettle and they can't work on Manus island and people for that reason are not willing to transfer from the detention centre to East Lorengau transit accommodation.

Mr Rintoul says those refugees already moved to a transit centre on Manus are just as vulnerable if not more than before.

IAN RINTOUL:  The fact that they moved to East Lorengau doesn't solve any problems for them. There's no resettlement arrangements, no capacity for family reunion, no capacity to work, no capacity to move to other places in Papua New Guinea.

A local MP, Ronnie Knight, says Manus has made it clear all along that it will not accept refugees.  He has warned about growing social problems around the presence of refugees in the community.

RONNIE KNIGHT:  So I'm just seeing the situation escalating in the next few months or years. I really believe that something should be done quickly. I'm not against the asylum seekers. Maybe they have genuine cause to leave their country but they did it the wrong way and they ended up in this situation. Australia should take a little bit more of a lead to find a third country for them or whatever, because in Papua New Guinea these people will not be able to go and beat sago in somebody else's patch and they will not be able to go fishing in someone else's waters - they'll end up being speared or murdered, and that'll be the next problem.

Human rights Watch's Asia Director Brad Adams says conditions at the Manus centre are poor and reports continue to emerge about abuse of the detainees.  Australia, he says, should take responsibility for lumping PNG with the problem.

BRAD ADAMS: You know it's a very poor country and it's an outrage that Australia is pushing its problems on a poorer country essentially by buying them off. They're asking for trouble to drop large numbers of refugees into a country that has no capacity to deal with them and no history of dealing with this kind of problem.

He suspects Australia doesn't want there to be resettlement, at least to countries where people would be happy to go, because it thinks this will act as a pull factor for more "boat people".  Meanwhile, Rimbink Pato said those people on Manus not deemed refugees will be required to go home, and can either be assisted to return voluntarily or else be deported.