Australia has lost a great defender of asylum seekers
With the death of former PM Malcolm Fraser last week, following that in October of his erstwhile political foe and in later life good friend, also PM, Gough Whitlam, Australia has lost a much-needed voice of moderation and compassion.
Fraser became a vocal critic of contemporary conservative politics in Australia, particularly the treatment and detention of asylum-seekers.
Coming soon after a report in which the UN Special Rappor-teur on Torture found that aspects of Australia’s policies on asylum-seekers held in detention centres violated the convention against torture, now a government inquiry into allegations of sexual and physical assault at the Australian immigration processing centre on the Pacific island of Nauru has found that guards may have traded marijuana for sex with asylum-seekers while there have been three allegations of rape at the centre.
The current PM Tony Abbott has reacted to this review by saying “things happen”. This is chillingly reminiscent of the famous comment by former US Defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld that “stuff happens” when speaking about the mistreatment of prisoners in the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.
Edward Duhigg
Bangkok
