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DETAINEES AT AN Australian asylum-seeker camp in Papua New Guinea won millions of dollars in compensation for “degrading and cruel” treatment in a decision hailed as an important human rights victory.
Abuse, self-harm and mental health problems are reportedly rife in offshore processing centres, with detainees resorting to desperate protests like sewing their own lips together to raise awareness of their plight.
The AUS$70 million (€47 million) conditional settlement, to be shared by 1,905 people who have been held on Manus Island since 2012, averted a public trial against the government and security providers Transfield and G4S.
A class action had sought damages for what claimants said was suffering due to the harsh conditions in which they were held.
It also called for a payout for false imprisonment after the Papua New Guinea Supreme Court ruled last year that holding asylum-seekers on Manus Island was unconstitutional and illegal.
Law firm Slater and Gordon said they believed it was the largest human rights class action settlement in Australian history, with the defendants also agreeing to pay more than Aus$20 million in costs.
“The people detained on Manus Island have endured extremely hostile conditions, but they will no longer suffer in silence,” said the firm’s Andrew Baker.
“While no amount of money could fully recognise the terrible conditions the detainees endured, we hope today’s settlement can begin to provide them with an opportunity to help put this dark chapter of their lives behind them.”
The Manus detention facility opened in 2012 to hold people trying to enter Australia by boat, under a tough immigration policy that sends them offshore to be processed.
They are blocked from resettling in Australia even if found to be refugees.
Conditions in the camp, and another one on Nauru in the Pacific, have been widely criticised by refugee advocates and medical professionals, with reports of maltreatment and neglect, leading to serious health problems.
Amnesty International called the decision “historic” and “a major crack in the Australian government’s crumbling system of abuse”.
“It must be a turning point towards a better solution for refugees, one that is grounded in protection, not abuse,” said Amnesty Pacific researcher Kate Schuetze.
Prudent outcome
Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said the payout was not an admission of liability, but to avoid a costly six-month trial.
“In such circumstances a settlement was considered a prudent outcome for Australian taxpayers,” he said in a statement.
“The Commonwealth strongly refutes and denies the claims made in these proceedings. Settlement is not an admission of liability in any regard.”
Slater and Gordon lawyer Rory Walsh said the government and its contractor’s defence “was that it was the PNG authorities doing the imprisoning and detaining and not them”.
“The denial of liability allows the Commonwealth and the defendants to run those positions in any other cases and maintain that position,” he told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
Lead plaintiff Majid Kamasaee, an Iranian, welcomed the settlement as an overdue acknowledgement of the suffering he and others endured.
“This case is not just about me, it is about every person who has been trapped on Manus Island,” said Kamasaee, who was held there for 11 months
“I left my home in Iran in 2013 because of religious persecution and I came to Australia seeking peace, but I was sent to Manus, which was hell.
“The way we were treated at the Manus Island detention centre was degrading and cruel.”
While the Manus camp needs to close following the PNG court decision, Dutton has made clear those housed there would not be moved to Australia but instead relocated to third countries such as the United States and Cambodia, or resettled in PNG.
The government has not revealed any plans to shut down the Nauru facility.
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Australia have every right not to land anyone on their shores that they do not want.
If only we had the balls – we send the bloody Navy halfway round the world to pick them up!
@CeannairBlue: Actually they don’t hence the lawsuit and them losing. They broke international and their own national laws
@Kal Ipers: Then I’ll rephrase. THEY BLOODY WELL SHOULD DO!
@CeannairBlue: So you are fine with when countries refused to allow a ship with refugees fleeing the holocaust during WWII? They eventually returned to the Nazis and were killed in concentration camps. You think the agreements and laws brought in to never allow that to happen again should be scrapped?
@Kal Ipers: Ah the old Godwin’s Law, where would the intellectually challenged be without it.
No, I wouldn’t have been okay with that. But I’m okay with this and the knobheads legging from Syria and leaving their wives and kids behind because “THEY’RE NOT FLEEING A HOLOCAUST”.
@CeannairBlue: quoting the relevant laws is not Godwins Law.
@CeannairBlue: Hard not to mention the Nazis when they are the reason for the laws. Many of these people were fleeing certain death if they stayed.
Do you know anything about the people and how they were treated? The suicide rate in Naru camps is shocking. Do you think these people killed themselves for a laugh?
@CeannairBlue: so the millions that left Ireland because of the famine should have been abandoned as well huh!! Short memories eh!
@Marie Agnew: abandoned? Abandoned would be preferable to internment
@Dave O Keeffe: Did I say it was ? Invoking the Holocaust is.
@Marie Agnew: We also weren’t leaving the country to sponge off the nearest country – we went there because a third of the country were dying of starvation.
One in those places, we bloody well went to work.
Honestly I used to be a left wing socialist but ffs the “left” nowadays want a slap.
@Clever Jake: The Pope is a better man than I am. Thank God.
So how does this effect their refugee status ??
@CeannairBlue: I think this issue was dealt with at Nuremberg. All people have human rights which should not be subject to artificial borders arbitrarily drawn for political reasons.
@Marie Agnew: Read a history book and educate yourself how can you compare the irish leaving to go to america and the rest of the world with whats going on now .
@Kal Ipers: I doubt they even care about that . . They protected their borders and sent a message out and it stopped the boats arriving illegally. .
@CeannairBlue: The law around this issue was created because of the legal grey area that existed on people fleeing the threat of concentration camps. To call mentioning where the law originated Godwin’s Law shows your absolute lack of understanding of the issue and human rights laws.
@Dave O Keeffe: No, you would like it to. Nice try.
@CeannairBlue: I think you seriously need to look into what’s actually happening in countries like Syria.
@Kal Ipers:if they were fleeing certain death why did they go so far ? im sure there were nearer countrys they could go to, but hold on they probably wouldnt have been allowed in and would not of got any support or special treatment, would it not make more sence to stay at home and fight for your country….
Even sovereign countries have no control over their own borders and rules.
@SteveW: Not when they sign agreements saying they will take in refugees and then don’t. They actually broke their own rules. Their own courts and laws are what is being enforced.
@SteveW: History will look harshly upon Australia’s treatment of asylum seekers, a continent pillaged by Europeans.
@Siouxsie Dumbtime: Such an appropriate screen name with a comment like that.
@CeannairBlue: In how far is it incorrect that she mentioned that Australia was pillaged by Europeans?
@CeannairBlue: It’s an historically accurate statement so bully you!
@Siouxsie Dumbtime: sure the Aussies are worried
Irish Right’s groups will be licking their lips as we speak.
@Clever Jake: Best to ignore them. Everybody else does.
@Clever Jake: block them!!
@Carl Ingalls: the horror of not helping people who weren’t lucky enough to be born in a free society. If you had your way we’d be back in far-right paradise with human rights very restricted. No thanks.
Go home
@Alex: The colonists?
@Siouxsie Dumbtime: it’s a pity the originals didn’t send them packing centuries ago.
@Trevor W: So true, they have treated the aboriginals disgracefully and now asylum seekers, one set of rules for the white man and another for anyone of colour.
simple answer send them back from whever they came from, no asylum….
@Peter donnelly: The Europeans? We’d have no room for all those descendants of Irish convicts.
@Siouxsie Dumbtime: slight problem there the irish who were forced onto death ships god knows how long age were forced to go they diddnt chose to go, and when they finished their sentance they worked for a living not expecting any one to feed and house them any irish who emmigrated went to work and try to better themselves but unfortunatly not all of them made it….
I’d say a lot of Australians will consider that money well spent.
As there will be a flood of people saying how this is riddiculious I suggest you read up on what they did to these people. Also read what Australia did to Naru and to the captain of a boat who rescued people from a sinking boat.
@CeannairBlue: *can’t
@CeannairBlue: You can’t be bothered reading, yet comment here, venting your faux outrage about refugees having a right to be treated humanely, the sure sign of a hypocrite and troll
@Dave O Keeffe: Difference between hitting the wrong key and the inability to spell. Troll.
@CeannairBlue: best not to make a mistake when correcting others, makes you look ridiculous. Ha, troll. Says the moron that has no idea why most laws around concentration camps and many about refugees seem to have been agreed upon in the 40′s.
Why don’t all the lefties move to all their countries and make it better for them so they don’t have to leave. Problem solved
@Mumpsimus: why don’t all righties F off to their own country? Oh yeah they still want to get a woman!!!
@Mumpsimus: keyboard warriors
Who let all of the white Caucasian Christian immigrants into Australia? The place is overrun with them.
The Aboriginal people should not have let all of the white foreigners in.
Who all entered legally into the country ….
@Suzie Sunshine: no, they did not.
@Tony Daly: and look how prosperous the country is all these decades later. Germany decided to let in 500,000+ migrants into their country and they stab 5 year old boys, assault and women and plough through innocent people shopping at a Christmas market. Infact lets compare east Europe to west europe. West lets in migrants = dramatic increase in terror attacks. East stands firmly against letting in migrants = virtually no terror attacks to my knowledge. Coincidence?
@Suzie Sunshine: Time to revisit your primary school history books.
@Siouxsie Dumbtime: they weren’t the migrants I was referring to
@Suzie Sunshine: who were you referring to then?
You can’t put refugees in a concentration camp? Who knew!
Australians should stop messing about and deport all immigrants and their families who arrived since 1606
I hope they have the decency now to repay the Australian taxpayers, for the cost incurred by them, for the provision of their refugee accommodation…
Regardless of the level of accommodation, the burden of its cost shouldn’t now be borne by Australia, given these people’s new found wealth!
It’s a small justice. As multi-cultural as it is in Oz it is seriously racist in many ways.
Read up on the Tampa affair. Will explain a lot for the keyboard warriors on here.
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