Pearls and Irritations

Tag: Human Rights

  • Hitting rock-bottom! John Menadue

    Today Tony Abbott and Scott Morrison have announced draconian measures that will inflict enormous punishment on over 30,000 asylum seekers who have arrived in Australia over recent years by boat.  These draconian policies will apply not just to future boat arrivals but will be applied retrospectively to over 30,000 asylum seekers who are already legally here.

    We can imagine the widespread protests if any Australian government announced retrospective changes in taxation or other important policies, but some of the most vulnerable in the world are fair game in Australian politics.

    What a shameful country we have become. The poisoning of public opinion against asylum seekers which began with Tampa in 2001 is getting worse by the day.

    Tony Abbott and Scott Morrison propose:

    • None of these 30.000 asylum seekers will ever be granted permanent residence even if they are found to be refugees.
    • They will be denied access to any appeal processes. Clerks in the Department of Immigration and Citizenship will exercise control over their lives.
    • Persons found to be refugees will get a temporary protection visa which will deny them the right to sponsor family. The only way that they can re-join their family will be to return to the country from which they fled because of danger.

    Amongst these 30,000 asylum seekers in Australia are many whose lives have been put at risk because of the actions of Australian Governments to intervene in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Not only has our involvement in those two wars been futile and cost many Australian lives, it has put at risk many Iraqis and Afghans who will now pay a huge price as the civil war in Iraq extends and the withdrawal of Western forces from Afghanistan leaves more and more Afghans exposed to danger. But we show no concern that some of these people now in Australia cannot call on the Australian government or people for protection or decency.

    This announcement today continues the demonization of asylum seekers that has been going on for years. Scott Morrison, who would be the Minister for Immigration in an Abbott Government, said in his maiden speech in 2008 ‘From my faith I derive the values of loving kindness, justice and righteousness”. Yet he has told us on many occasions

    • That asylum seekers bring “disease, everything from tuberculosis and Hepatitis C to Chlamydia and syphilis”.
    • He told 2GB talk-back radio that he had seen asylum seekers bringing in “wads of cash and large displays of jewellery”.
    • According to Jane Cadzow, in the Sun Herald he told the Coalition to ‘ramp up its questioning to … capitalise on anti-Muslim sentiment’.
    • In early 2002, he complained about the cost of holding funerals in Sydney for asylum seekers who had died in a shipwreck off Christmas Island.  He referred to funding for an 8 year old boy whose parents had been drowned as a ‘government funded junket’.

    Senator Abetz, a migrant himself and apparently a devout Lutheran said that asylum seekers in the community should be registered in the same way as paedophiles.

    Tony Abbott, the seminary-trained and student of the Jesuits, continually calls asylum seekers ‘illegals’ when they are not. He wants us to believe that they are criminals. He has never called Scott Morrison into line.

    Who will call a stop to our inhumanity? In world terms, with 45 million refugees and displaced persons, the number of asylum seekers coming to Australia is miniscule. When will we get out of our parochial stupor and appreciate the real world beyond our shores? But history shows that it is so easy for unscrupulous politicians to exploit fear of the foreigner, the outsider and the person who is different.

    Malcolm Fraser we need you now.

  • Regional Settlement Agreement with Papua New Guinea – a post-script. John Menadue

    With the dust settling a little I thought it might be safe to return to this issue!

    I said in my blog of July 20 that I supported the general thrust of the RSA with PNG, although a lot remained to be sorted out and the implementation is already showing signs of problems. Without repeating myself too much, however, I emphasise the following.

    • We cannot ignore that close to 1,000 souls have been drowned at sea trying to get by boat to Australia. Surely the critics cannot ignore this.
    • Regional arrangements are the only way to go. It involves burden-sharing and cooperation, particularly now with PNG. We can’t fix the problem on our own as we found during the Indochina outflow of the late 1970s and early 1980s.
    • Active involvement by UNHCR in this arrangement is most important. Both Australia and PNG are signatories to the Refugee Convention with PNG recently withdrawing its reservation. The UNHCR is considering the arrangement.
    • Children cannot be exempted from the arrangement or the boats will fill up with children. Other arrangements are necessary to protect children.
    • For several years I have highlighted that asylum seekers arriving by air have exceeded boat arrivals by a significant margin and the politicians and the media ignored that fact. But now the facts have changed. Boat arrivals in the first six months of 2013 were about 14,000, a trebling compared with the 4,500 who arrived in the first six months of last year.If boat arrivals continued at this rate  the whole refugee/humanitarian program in 2013 of 20,000 persons  would have been taken over entirely by boat arrivals.That was clearly unacceptable. As John Maynard Keynes said, ‘when the facts change, I change my view’. The facts have changed in respect of boat arrivals.
    • The public hostility to boat arrivals, although quite irrational at times in my view, was threatening to prejudice the whole humanitarian and refugee program of our country. This program must be protected and expanded.
    • There is no ‘orderly queue’ for refugees but the fact is that with the trebling of asylum seekers arriving by boat in recent months it has a serious impact on those waiting in refugee camps in the region, Africa and the Middle East.
    • There has been some diversionary media coverage about the cost of the RSA with PNG. But the costs of existing arrangements are extremely high and look like increasing. The cost of offshore asylum seeker management by Department of Immigration and Citizenship is expected to be $2.9 billion this year; up $700 million on last year. The government has also allocated $1.4 billion to the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service. More money is spent by the Navy and some other agencies. By contrast, the foreign aid program to PNG will cost $517 million this year. If as the government hopes, boat arrivals slow there could be considerable savings. The government could also save money by abolishing mandatory detention.

    A lot remains to be done and implementation will be difficult as we are seeing already.

    • In the forthcoming regional conference of ministers that PM Rudd and President Yudhoyono agreed to, it must give emphasis to ‘upstream’ processing in Malaysia and Indonesia. This must be done in cooperation with UNHCR. Countries such as Australia must agree that they will cooperate on increased re-settlement places if regional countries are prepared to hold and process asylum seekers in their country.
    • We must redouble efforts to negotiate orderly departure arrangements with Afghanistan, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. This is essential to provide a safe and orderly way for persons facing discrimination in those countries to come to Australia without being forced to take dangerous and irregular journeys. Many of the people in these three countries who are anxious to leave have relatives in Australia. In 1983 Australia established an ODA with Vietnam which enabled 100,000 Vietnamese to come to Australia in a safe and orderly way without risking their lives at sea.
    • We badly need better cooperation between the NGOs who are naturally concerned about the plight of asylum seekers and with the policy-makers, particularly in DIAC. That is why Arja Keski-Nummi and I proposed a ‘second-track dialogue’ – see blog of July 9. Many of these NGOs need to be more constructive. It is not particularly helpful when they find themselves frequently on the same side of the political debate as Tony Abbott, Scott Morrison, Paul Sheehan and the Daily Telegraph. We live in a difficult political environment. There is no way of avoiding it.

  • Zimmerman – race or gender? Guest blogger: Marcus Einfeld

    Following their counterparts in the US, the attention of the international media has been attracted by the acquittal last Saturday by a Miami jury of 6 women of neighbourhood watch monitor George Zimmerman for shooting dead a young black teenager Trayvon Martin. My knowledge of the matter comes only from media reports but I have taken the trouble to seek out some of the more responsible outlets for these observations.

    There was no dispute that Zimmerman shot and killed Martin who was unarmed at the time. Zimmerman claimed that Martin attacked him and that he fired in self-defence. Even Trayvon’s mother, although unquestioningly loving of him, has not suggested that her son was an angel.

    Understandably having regard to the long repression of African Americans by the predominant white population, there has been an outcry of racism as the sole or main explanation for the jury’s unwillingness to convict Zimmerman of either murder or manslaughter. Black celebrities like Beyonce have appeared at demonstrations to attack the verdict. President Obama spoke of the possibility that he might once have been Trayvon. Unlike Australia and many other places including other states of the US, a conviction for manslaughter in Florida would apparently have brought a sentence of life imprisonment.

    It is well known that America has had serious problems of racism throughout its history, and there is no reason to believe that either Zimmerman or his jury was unaffected by this scourge, one way or the other. However, there was apparently no evidence at the trial that Zimmerman had any history of racist attitudes or views.

    Moreover, before this jury was selected, each of the original panel was allowed to be interrogated about their possible biases and other motivations. This process, not generally followed in Australia or the UK, is designed to and often does throw up serious prejudices on the part of potential jurors that might affect the fair judgment of the case. Nothing apparently emerged to suggest that any of the eventual six jurors had any views that militated against an unbiased verdict in this case.

    So allow me to put an entirely different possible explanation of his acquittal. In my long experience as an advocate and a Judge, there was one thread of consistency. Assuming he is not a thug with an actual or presumed history of criminality, or the central allegation is of violence against a woman whose account is credible, a young man is significantly less likely to be convicted by female jurors than by males. This phenomenon may arise because women, especially mothers, have an acute understanding of how young men and boys get into trouble, perhaps born of their experiences with their own sons. They are also very quick to defend their sons of allegations of miscreances. Men tend to be much less patient and tolerant of young men, perhaps knowing what they did as young men themselves.

    In an interview with CNN after the trial, one woman juror spoke of the evidence given at the trial by a young female friend of the victim, called by the prosecution, as being unhelpful and unconvincing, for which read untrue. My second piece of relevant experience, then, is that women are infinitely more judgmental of other women than men. Women can tell that another woman is lying much more perceptively than men who tend to be protective and understanding, even forgiving.

    Taking all this into account, it is certainly worth considering that the combination of these two peculiarly female factors is just as likely to have affected the verdict as racism.

  • The Regional Settlement Arrangement with Papua New Guinea. John Menadue

    With some reservations I support the general thrust of the RSA with PNG. I do that largely for the same reasons that I supported the earlier proposed agreement with Malaysia.

    The RSA is in PM Rudd’s words ‘a hard line’ but I see it as the least worst option given the present intractable political impasse and the 850 souls who have been drowned at sea. Where were their human rights?

    The arrangement does offer the prospect of slowing or stopping boat arrivals whereas the revamped Nauru policy did not. Nauru was never going to work a second time because even after the ‘no-advantage test’ and delays in processing, persons knew that in going to Nauru they would finally finish up in Australia or New Zealand. Now they will be resettled in PNG. Furthermore Nauru as an island state a long way to the east would never be part of a regional solution.

    I supported the Malaysian agreement because it offered at that time the best prospect of building a regional arrangement. This has always been and remains for me the only sensible way forward. Furthermore UNHCR was prepared to work with Malaysia and Australia on the agreement.  I had several reservations about the agreement, including the cap on numbers, penalties and the risks to children. It seems that these concerns have been addressed in the RSA with PNG.

    What is important is not where processing occurs, but is it humane, fair and efficient.

    In the submission that Arja Keski-Nummi (former First Assistant Secretary, Refugee, Humanitarian and International Division of the Immigration Department) and I made to the Expert Panel on asylum seekers in July 2012, we said.

    Offshore/Regional Processing

    While the High Court ruled against the agreement with Malaysia there remains a place for considering the regional processing of asylum seekers….   

    In 1998, UNHCR at its Executive Committee (ExCom) envisaged the possibility of transferring people from one state to another for processing and made the following conclusion:

     No.85 (XLIX) : stresses that, as regards the return to a third country of an asylum seeker whose claim has yet to be determined from the territory of the country where the claim has been submitted, including pursuant to bilateral or multilateral readmission agreements, it should be established that the third country will treat the asylum seeker(s) in accordance with accepted international standards, will ensure effective protection against refoulement, and will provide the asylum seekers with the possibility to seek and enjoy asylum.

     The High Court found the agreement with Malaysia could not be upheld because Malaysia:

     1. was not a signatory to the refugee convention,

    2. did not have in place a system of refugee status determination,

    3. did not have in law guarantees against non-refoulement, and

    4. did not give people some legal status while on their territory. 

     In short it could not be found to provide Effective Protection. 

     If new agreements in the region were to be considered the key issue to tackle would be the question of effective protection.   For example, it could be made explicit that a person has Effective Protection if: 

    • people were given a legal status while they are in a transit country  
    • people had access to other rights such as work – supporting  livelihoods, education for children etc.
    • people could access a refugee determination process either within the legal  jurisdiction of the state or by UNHCR
    •  were not detained  and
    • the principle of non-refoulement was honoured

    If a country is willing to enter into an agreement with these provisos then effective protection could be said to have been achieved. 

     However the complexities of such an agreement would need to be negotiated and would demand careful assessment of the legislation required to bring this into effect. …

     Bali ministers have endorsed the concept of states exploring such arrangements. These opportunities should be pursued, not to “stop the boats” although no doubt that is the desire of many, but if done well have the potential to start the process of building a durable protection system in the region – one in which the protection outcomes for all asylum seekers can be significant…

     New initiatives are always controversial.  The Comprehensive Plan of Action for Indo Chinese Refugees (CPA) while today seen as a model of regional cooperation at the time was not without its critics. Host governments’ commitments to providing a protection space in the region were tested, resettlement countries’ commitments were regularly questioned, UNHCR was moving into unchartered territories particularly in the way it was to engage with Vietnam and in redefining its mandate. NGOs and powerful lobby groups were not happy. 

     If we are ever to achieve a regional cooperation framework it will take a considerable time and we need to work with what is available now step by step, difficult as these may be. (The full submission can be found on my web site. See below. Click on refugees etc.)

    At the press conference following the announcement of the RSA, the Australian Attorney General said ‘This arrangement will be entirely in accordance with Australia’s international and domestic law obligations. PNG is of course a signatory to the Refugee Convention and, as has been indicated by both prime ministers, PNG is going to withdraw the reservation that it had to the Refugee Convention in respect of people who are to be transferred from Australia. What that means is that all people transferred to PNG will have the full benefit of the rights that come to them under the Refugee Convention.’ (end of quote)

    It is to be hoped that this serves to address the High Court’s concerns. The earlier decision by the High Court and the subsequent parliamentary impasse was in my view a major setback for regional cooperation.

    The RSA is a bilateral arrangement which must become part of a framework of other regional arrangements. PM Rudd said that the RSA will be ‘part of our broader approach on regional cooperation arrangements’. We can’t ‘fix’ these problems on our own. There has to be burden-sharing as the arrangement with PNG is. This arrangement follows the announcement a few days ago that Indonesia will deny visa-free entry to Indonesia for Iranians.

    The regional conference being called as a result of PM Rudd’s meeting with President Yudhoyono must urgently consider processing centres in other regional countries in association with UNHCR and on the understanding that resettlement countries such as Australia will increase their refugee intake.

    Australia has already increased its humanitarian intake from 13,000 to 20,000 p.a. At his Brisbane press conference PM Rudd said that if progress is made on further regional discussions Australia would lift its intake again. The Expert Panel recommended that the intake be lifted to 27,000 over five years. I think it should be at least 30,000.

    In his statement PM Rudd said that he had spoken with the UN Secretary General about the RSA with PNG. But he did not mention the UNHCR which must be a key player in the arrangement with PNG. It has the necessary experience and credibility.

    There are a lot of important issues that must be addressed. What will happen in regard to family reunion of asylum seekers sent to PNG who have family in Australia? Will asylum seekers sent to PNG have appeal rights? Will they have work rights in PNG? Will they be detained in prison-like conditions similar to Christmas Island?

    The Australian government must also urgently redouble its efforts to negotiate orderly departure programs with Afghanistan, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

    The Greens have called the RSA ‘a day of shame’. But the real ‘day of shame’ was when the Greens voted in the Senate with Tony Abbott’s coalition to strike down the enabling legislation which would have allowed a renegotiated Malaysian Agreement to proceed. Since that time there has been chaos and failure of refugee policy in Australia. The Greens must bear heavy responsibility for this. As Gough Whitlam said in a different context ‘Only the impotent are pure’.

    The RSA has been obviously negotiated quickly. As PM Rudd said ‘many other steps lie ahead’. But this arrangement with PNG based on burden-sharing is a much more promising approach than the recent nonsense about amending the Refugee Convention and describing increasing number of refugees as really only ‘economic migrants’.

    A key test for the RSA must be – does it provide effective protection?

    The other key issue will be implementation.


     

  • Don’t race to the bottom on asylum seekers!

    Kevin Rudd, in your review of asylum seeker policy please don’t let Foreign Minister Carr lead you to a race to the bottom with Tony Abbott.

    The media is clearly being briefed that in a revision of asylum policy, the Government is considering tougher new country assessments by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. It is suggested by the Foreign Minister that this is necessary to exclude persons who are really economic migrants.

    In my blog of July 5, I expressed concern that the Foreign Minister was implying that the Refugee Review Tribunal was too soft on refugee determination.

    In primary decisions on asylum seekers and according to UNHCR data, Australia is about in the mid-range in refugee determination in the first instance.  The rates for refugee determination that did not go to further review were as follows.

    Australia                             46%

    Canada                               42%

    Denmark                             46%

    Germany                             32%

    New Zealand                     28%

    Norway                               56%

    Sweden                               49%

    UK                                        37%

    It is difficult to compare final refugee determination rates as appeal processes differ greatly between countries. If there is reliable information available on country comparisons I would like to see it. We do know however that the final rate of refugee determination in Indonesia is 94%. This compares with final determination rates in Australia for the March quarter 2013 – 91% for boat arrivals and 65% for air arrivals.

    Frankly I would have much greater confidence in the RRT and its processes than the Department of Immigration and Citizenship and the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. In the primary process asylum seekers are likely to be disoriented and confused and dealing with a very alien situation. The RRT has the experience and professionalism to sort out the merits of asylum claims. Denis O’Brien who headed the RRT for five years asserted that ‘members of the RRT have to apply the definition … under the Refugee Convention. So I don’t see a lot of scope for tightening up without running foul of the United Nations Commissioner for Refugees’.

    Today the Australian Human Rights Commissioner, Professor Gillian Triggs, said ‘There is no evidence to support the Government’s economic migrant claim … When we were assessing asylum seekers claims up until August 13 last year, approximately 90% of claims for refugee status were found to be valid. So I think that Senator Carr is making an assumption for which there is no evidence.’

    In the weighing of evidence, I would place great weight on organisations such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International in their assessments of human rights violations and persecution around the world. They are experienced in this field. They get their hands dirty in dealing with the everyday problems of persons facing persecution. By contrast, DFAT officers are relatively inexperienced and live in remote and privileged foreign enclaves. Furthermore DFAT is very keen to maintain good relations with foreign governments and their agencies. These are often the very same organisations that asylum seekers see as their persecutors. I would seriously discount the advice from the governments of Afghanistan, Iran and Sri Lanka and their brutal intelligence and security services. The government of Canada has said that it will not be attending the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in November in Colombo this year unless the human rights position in Sri Lanka improves.

    I have confidence in the independence and professionalism of the RRT to make just and considered final decisions.

    Tony Abbott sheds crocodile tears over asylum seekers drowned at sea. He and Scott Morrison have demonised asylum seekers for years as illegals; they bring disease and wads of cash. Coalition concern for asylum seekers is largely seen as a political opportunity. On the 10th December 2010 the Sydney Morning Herald reported from Wikileaks that a key Liberal Party strategist told a US diplomat in Canberra in November 2009 that the issue of asylum seekers was ‘fantastic’ for the Coalition and ‘the more boats that come the better’. Tony Abbott shows that that still remains the approach of the Coalition.

    As Malcolm Fraser said in a guest blog on July15 the plight of asylum seekers and deaths at sea is a world-wide problem that we cannot fix on our own.  He said the only solution is a regional agreement based on two key elements. The first is that regional countries that bear a much heavier burden than we do on asylum seekers and refugees are prepared to hold and process in their country those who claim refugee protection. This must be done in association with UNHCR. The second is that settlement countries such as Australia, Canada, US and NZ must provide finance to regional countries and promptly agree to the resettlement of those that are found to be refugees.

    Unilateralism will not work for anyone. The key is burden-sharing. The conference called by President Yudhoyono to build a regional framework must be pursued with urgency. It combines both good policy and good politics. It is to be hoped that the Government will not go down the track that Foreign Minister Carr is suggesting.

  • Stopping the boats decently – can it be done? Guest blogger: Frank Brennan SJ

    In this last financial year, “25,145 people have arrived on 394 boats – an average of over 70 people and more than a boat a day” as Scott Morrison, Tony Abbott’s Shadow Minister never tires of telling us.  Except for Sri Lankans, most of those arriving by boat come not directly from their country of persecution but via various countries with Indonesia being their penultimate stop.   There is an understandable bipartisan concern in the Australian parliament about the blowout of boat arrivals to 3,300 per month.  An arrival rate of that sort (40,000 pa) puts at risk the whole offshore humanitarian program and distorts the migration and family reunion program.

    Here are the contours for a better approach here in Australia – better than committing to forcibly turning around boats on the high seas, à la Abbott, and better than transporting people to Nauru and Manus Island for processing or to Malaysia to join an asylum queue of 100,000 or permitting people to reside in the Australian community but without work rights and with inadequate welfare provision under the rubric of a “no advantage” test, à la Gillard.  We must abandon the ill-defined, unworkable “no advantage test”.  It’s not a test at all; it’s not a principle; it’s not a policy; it’s a slogan as unhelpful as “Stop the boats”.

    The contours follow the letter and spirit of the Refugee Convention against a backdrop of our providing at least 20,000 humanitarian places a year in our migration program, 12,000 of those being for refugees.

    We need to ensure that those risking the perilous sea voyage are in direct flight from persecution being unable to avail themselves adequate protection or processing en route in Indonesia.  If they were able to avail themselves such services in Indonesia, the Australian government would be entitled to set up disincentives and to return them safely to Indonesia.  If that number were in direct flight from persecution, the Australian government would be justified in setting up measures providing only temporary protection and denying family reunion other than on terms enjoyed by other migrants.  But I don’t think that would be necessary.  It should be a matter not of taking the sugar off the table but of trying to put the sugar out of reach except to those in direct flight from persecution, and leaving the sugar available to those who manage to reach the table whether by plane or boat, with or without a visa. And that’s because there is always sugar on Australian tables no matter who is sitting with us.  And so it should remain.  I have never understood why the less than honest asylum seeker arriving by plane, having sought a visa not for asylum but for tourism or business, should be given preferential treatment over the honest asylum seeker arriving by boat who says, “I am here to seek asylum.”

    Boats carrying asylum seekers from Indonesia to Australia could legally be indicted by Australian authorities within our contiguous zone (24 nautical miles offshore from land, including Christmas Island).  The passengers could be offloaded and taken to Christmas Island for a prompt assessment to ensure that none of them fit the profile of a person in direct flight from Indonesia fearing persecution by Indonesia.  Pursuant to a regional arrangement or bilateral agreement between Australia and Indonesia, Indonesia could guarantee not to refoule any person back to the frontiers of a country where they would face persecution nor to remove any person to a country unwilling to provide that guarantee.  Screened asylum seekers from Christmas Island could then be safely flown back to Indonesia for processing.

    With adequate resourcing, a real queue could be created for processing and resettlement.  Provided there had been an earlier, extensive advertising campaign, Indonesian authorities would then be justified in placing any returned boat people at the end of the queue.  Assured safe return by air together with placement at the end of the queue would provide the deterrent to persons no longer in direct flight from persecution risking life and fortune boarding a boat for Australia. In co-operation with UNHCR and IOM, Australia could provide the financial wherewithal to enhance the security and processing arrangements in Indonesia.  Both governments could negotiate with other countries in the region to arrange  more equitable burden sharing in the offering of resettlement places for those proved to be refugees.  Australian politicians would need to give the leadership to the community explaining why it would be necessary and decent for Australia then to receive more proven refugees from the region, including those who fled to our region fearing persecution in faraway places like Afghanistan.

    The safeguards negotiated in Indonesia and any other country in the region to which unprocessed asylum seekers were to be sent would need to comply with the minimum safeguards set by the Houston Expert Panel when they reviewed the Gillard Government’s proposed Malaysia Arrangement.  The Panel said:

    There are concerns that relate to the non-legally binding nature of the Arrangement, the scope of oversight and monitoring mechanisms, the adequacy of pre-transfer assessments, channels for appeal and access to independent legal advice, practical options for resettlement as well as issues of compliance with international law obligations and human rights standards (particularly in relation to non-refoulement, conditions in Malaysia, standards of treatment and unaccompanied minors).

    (This blog is an extract from Frank Brennan’s Reply to “Get back to where you once belonged!”, a presentation by Jeff Crisp, the Head of the Policy Division and Evaluation Service of UNHCR in Geneva, at this week’s National Asylum Summit at the Hawke Centre, University of South Australia)

  • What is powering Japan’s foreign policy? Guest blogger Walter Hamilton

     

    Could it be they are handing out “macho pills” at the Japanese Foreign Ministry? Has it become de rigueur for the country’s diplomats to browbeat international forums? Are internal divisions within the ministry about to break out into open policy warfare? 

    There are at present enough straws in the wind to invite these questions.

    The metaphoric “macho pills” might explain the extraordinary outburst by Japan’s Human Rights Ambassador (and former Ambassador to Australia), Hideaki Ueda, during a recent UN committee hearing. He was responding to an African delegate’s criticism of Japan for not allowing lawyers to be present during police interrogations of suspects. As Ueda attempted to explain how his country was among the “most advanced” in this field, there were audible sniggers from unidentified attendees. “Don’t laugh! Why are you laughing?” protested Ueda. “Shut up! Shut up!” (The rant is viewable on YouTube.) Although one may make allowances for the wear-and-tear of spending too much time at UN talkfests, this was an ugly face to bring to a discussion on human rights. It might be best if Mr. Ueda goes off the pills. 

    The “macho pills”, meanwhile, are being crunched like sembei crackers over at the Prime Minister’s Office in Tokyo. When a former head of the Foreign Ministry’s Asian and Oceanian Affairs Bureau, Hitoshi Tanaka, aired his concern in the press about an apparent shift to the right in foreign policy, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe gave him a shellacking on Facebook. Tanaka, he said, was “not qualified” to talk about diplomacy because he had previously shown a gross lack of judgement when handling the delicate issue of Japanese kidnapped to North Korea. Abe did not hesitate to reveal details of government discussions to which had been privy. 

    Reports indicate Abe is about to elevate Akitaka Saiki to the position of Vice Foreign Minister (the ministry’s top bureaucratic role), replacing an appointee who has been in the job only a year. Saiki is another who is well known to Australian diplomats. His elevation will not have been hindered by his previous support for Abe’s tough line on North Korea, a policy area in which Saiki has particular expertise. He is also a former Ambassador to India – a relationship Japan wishes to foster as a counterweight to China. Some reports suggest he takes a hawkish position on the Senkaku/Diaoyu territorial dispute, although that would simply reflect current government policy. The same reports are foreshadowing a larger clean out of positions in the Foreign Ministry to better align policymaking with the views of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party. With the vexed question of constitutional change very much in play under the LDP’s leadership, the party and the government will want a unified diplomatic offensive to explain its tampering with the constitution’s pacifist clauses.

    The appearance of a ministry undergoing internal ructions – and of some elements within and without resenting the political whip hand – is becoming more of a spectacle day by day.

     

    Walter Hamilton is a former Tokyo Correspondent for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the author of  “Children of the Occupation: Japan’s Untold Story”.

  • Euthanasia – A denial of human dignity. Guest blogger Dr Joanne Wright

    It is concerning that The Greens and organisations such as GetUp have seen fit to re-ignite the debate about the legalisation of euthanasia.  I am a doctor.  I worked in palliative care and now work with the elderly.  I have seen first hand the complexity of the issues at the end of life. In reality, most people who say they agree with euthanasia have little understanding of the issue at all.  The term as it is intended by pro-euthanasia activists refers to the intentional termination of life by another at the request of the person who wishes to die, not the withdrawal of futile care or “life support”.

    It is ironic that those with a pro-euthanasia stance refer to euthanasia as “dying with dignity”. I don’t know what is dignified about one person intentionally killing another or providing the means for their suicide.  It must change the person who does the deed irrevocably.  On the other hand, I have seen many dignified deaths.  Dignity has nothing to do with whether a person is faecally incontinent, disfigured, emotionally disturbed or unattractive.  Dignity has to do with the respect we accord every individual, regardless of personal characteristics or their current state of health.  Accepting death when it naturally occurs is quite different to condoning or encouraging the intentional killing of or suicide by another.

    Harvey Chochinov, a Canadian psychiatrist, has written extensively about dignity at the end of life and his views are valid in this context.  He describes the all-important interpersonal dimension to dignity.  Dr Chochinov’s model affirms the basic truth that human beings are relational and that what accords us dignity is how we are treated in a relationship.  The legalisation of euthanasia alters the interpersonal relationship between the vulnerable patient and their carers.  If the patient does not volunteer to be euthanased perhaps the patient is being selfish by remaining burdensome to others.  The idea that we can prevent subtle “coercion” through legislation shows a lack of understanding of the realities and subtleties of human relationships. History has shown that the people most commonly euthanased “voluntarily” are women, the mentally ill, socially isolated and socioeconomically disadvantaged.  These are the usual victims when society fundamentally loses its respect for human life.

    Having worked in palliative care, I have had requests from relatives and carers to euthanase dying people. What was evident was that these “observers” were suffering and wanted their own suffering to end. Vulnerable and sick patients often believe that they are a burden to those around them.  So do elderly people. I hear it from them all the time. We know that suffering is a reality in life.  Palliative care and modern medicine relieve most suffering but cannot relieve all.  When carers are able to rise to the occasion with conscientious caring for a vulnerable person, the dignity of that person is affirmed.  Much anxiety in the patient is also relieved.  For those few who really do suffer extreme and unrelieved existential anxiety at the end of life, good palliative care offers the option of sedation.

    It is widely recognised that Western Society has become detached from death.  We tuck away dying people in hospices or hospitals and often don’t have effective rituals surrounding death.  We shield our children from death.  As a society, we are in “death denial”.    We have a belief that modern medicine can, or at least should, cure every ill – this is false.  If we acknowledged the certainty of death perhaps we wouldn’t be panicked into the issue of euthanasia, or into continuing with futile and uncomfortable medical treatments.  We might have conversations with our relatives about our values and the situations in which we would want treatment to be withdrawn and even draw up legally binding Advance Care Directives.

    There are times in life when we must give care – and times when we must graciously accept it.  We must not as a society define the worth of individuals by their functional abilities or level of independence.  We must not decide that the means justifies the end or that our right to make autonomous decisions trumps our instinctive understanding that it is wrong to sanction the deliberate killing of another.  If we as a society and as individuals cannot accept that at times we have to face difficulty, then we cannot face the realities of life.  We also will not foster the qualities in society that make us civilised: empathy, compassion and the protection of the most vulnerable.

    Dr Joanne Wright

     

     

     

  • Child sexual abuse: who are the abusers? Guest blogger, Professor Kim Oates

    The awareness of the existence of child sex abuse, particularly its frequency, has only occurred in relatively recent times.  Now, we read or view daily stories about it. Whether this widespread public awareness of the problem has done much to prevent it and to help the victims is questionable, but it is better than our previous state of ignorance.

    Child sex abuse is not a new phenomenon. There is no good evidence that it is more common now than in the past.  However, before it started to be studied and publicised in the 1970s, it was hardly ever recognised and rarely discussed. This was mostly due to two factors.

    The first is that child sex abuse is done in secret. There are no corroborating witnesses. Only the victim and the offender know about it and the child’s secrecy is often bought with threats of dire consequences if the child ever reveals what has been happening to her.  If a child ever found the courage to say she had been sexually interfered with, she usually wasn’t believed.  Instead, she was likely to be punished for saying such a terrible thing.  This is still a problem for many children today.

    The second factor is denial. Child sexual abuse is an unpleasant topic.  It is a fact too hard, too unpleasant for most people to entertain or comprehend. In the past we didn’t see it, we didn’t recognise it and we didn’t believe it when we were told about because that made life too uncomfortable, too threatening.

    We are no longer ignorant but there is still a degree of denial. We now know it exists but we want it to be somewhere else, something that involves other people, other families, other institutions just as long as it’s nowhere near us.

    The much needed Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse may reinforce that view in the community and give us some degree of comfort that child sex abuse is someone else’s problem, not ours.

    However, a wide body of research, including research done in Australia, shows that most sexual abuse of children, boys as well as girls, occurs in or near their own homes, committed by people they are related to, who they know or who their families trust.

    Seventy five per cent of child sex abusers are people the child knows and trusts.  Contrary to some views, most offenders are not fathers. Approximately 15% are fathers or stepfathers, 30% are other male relatives of the child, 15% are family friends and 15% are acquaintances of the child and family. The remaining 25% of child sexual abuse offenders are strangers who have not met the children before.

    It is the group of 15% of offenders who are acquaintances of the child and family which includes those adults who have access to children in religious and other institutions and who use that trust to abuse a child.

    The current focus on the response of institutions to child sexual abuse is timely. It is essential.  But let’s not forget where most child sexual abuse occurs.  The uncomfortable fact is that for most children who are sexually abused, the abuse occurs in or near their own homes. And it is caused by people they know and who their families trust.

    Professor Kim Oates

     

  • The Darkening Shadow of Hate Speech in Japan. Guest blogger,Tessa Morris-Suzuki

    Japan’s new Prime Minister, Abe Shinzō, has proclaimed Japan a regional model of “democracy, the rule of law, and respect for human rights”. Indeed, Japan has proud traditions of free debate and grassroots human rights movements. But ironically – and largely ignored by the outside world – the rights of minorities and the work of those who fight hardest for human rights are under growing pressure in Abe’s Japan.

    Japan signed the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, but refuses to introduce anti-hate speech laws. One reason, according to the government, is that such laws are unnecessary, since Japan’s penal code prohibits group defamation, insult, threatening behaviour, and collective intimidation.

    But the limits of this approach have been on display in recent disturbing incidents. On 9 February, for example, a group of racist demonstrators –  including members of the best-known hate group, the Zaitokukai – marched through an ethnically diverse district of Tokyo, shouting incitements to violence and carrying placards with slogans such as “Kill Koreans”. A large police contingent was on hand, but despite abundant evidence of group defamation, threats and collective intimidation, none of the demonstrators was arrested.

    Matters were very different, though, when, around the same time, a Zaitokukai member lodged his own complaint of victimization. His claim, made more than four months after the event, was that he had been “assaulted” when refused entry to a September 2012 meeting organized by Japanese grassroots groups seeking apology and compensation for the former “comfort women” (women from throughout the Japanese empire coerced into serving in brothels run by the Japanese military during the Pacific War). Those who attended the meeting remember it as a peaceful event, despite the presence of a few menacing Zaitokukai protestors outside. Regardless of this fact, and of the curious delay in the complaint, police responded zealously to the Zaitokukai member’s claim, bringing in four members of the “comfort women” group for questioning and descending on members’ homes to search for incriminating evidence.

    Many in Japan work very hard for “democracy, the rule of law, and respect for human rights”. But there is no rule of law if the instigators of violence are allowed to peddle hatred, while those who pursue historical justice are subject to police harassment. Democracy is left impoverished when freedom of hate speech is protected more zealously than freedom of reasoned political debate.

    Tessa Morris-Suzuki 

     

  • Work rights for asylum seekers. Guest blogger: Bruce Kaye

    Having had direct experience of asylum seeker hosting it has become obvious at the ground level that the ‘no work’ policy introduced in August last year by the Federal Government is creating confusion and misery for the asylum seekers and frustration and despair for those involved in hosting.

    As citizens, my wife and I are happy to continue to provide this hospitality.  These people are in great need.  However it seems to us that the Government’s policy of not allowing these people to work simply makes it impossibly hard for them to live in the community at the end of their six weeks of homestay hospitality.  Not able to work they are driven into poverty, or the black economy. In any case dependence on Government resources is perpetuated instead of wages being earned and taxes paid.

    In order to live in the community they must be able to work.

    The new policy from August last year may look tough in the current political games of one upmanship, but it is inhumane and cruel and it simply will not achieve any effective settlement process for these people.  The longer they are forced into dependency and almost certain poverty by this new policy the harder it will be for them eventually to integrate into our society as contributing citizens.

    From where we are as hosts the new policy makes our contributions seem quite fruitless.  Extending humane personal hospitality to asylum seekers stands out in stark contrast to the cruel policy of the government.  As citizens and hosts that is a stark contradiction that is painfully embarrassing.

    Our experience on the ground shows the post August policy to be counter productive and makes us as Australian citizens feel really quite ashamed of our government.

    Bruce Kaye

  • Minister! Let them work.

    There is a growing number of asylum seekers living in the community who are not allowed to work. The new Minister, Brendan O’Connor, could put his stamp on the portfolio by immediately making a decision to allow almost all asylum seekers to work. The present policy of denial of work is cruel, denies the dignity of people and does not deter future asylum seekers.

    The number who are not allowed to work is growing as the government, quite rightly, is releasing from immigration detention and into the community, asylum seekers on bridging visas. There are presently about 7,000 asylum seekers in immigration detention, of whom about 5,000 are adult males. Potentially and hopefully many of these people will be released progressively into the community. In future as more boat people are released into the community so work rights will become more important.

    Official figures are hard to find, but it seems that releases of asylum seekers from detention into the community are running at an average of about 1,000 per month. In some months, it is much higher.

    I am a patron of the Asylum Seekers Centre in Sydney. Currently 46% of our clients have no work rights. That proportion and the total number is increasing rapidly. It is up dramatically over the last 12 months where more and more of our clients come by boat rather than air. Basically, asylum seekers who come by air are allowed to work but those who come by boat are not allowed to work. What a nonsense this is, particularly as boat arrivals have about double the rate of successful refugee determination as those who come by air.

    Asylum seekers living in the community are already placing heavy strains on the NGO’s that are struggling to help. These strains will increase on such organizations as Red Cross and the Asylum Seeker Centres.

    But the burden on the individual is the greatest worry. Most asylum seekers have escaped from terror and violence and many are traumatised. To deny them work rights is likely to worsen their mental state. It makes it harder for others to help them if they are forced into idleness. They are often humiliated within their family.

    In this situation, desperate asylum seekers are likely to feel they have no other choice but to take up work illegally. In this situation they are often exploited. This will give the Scott Morrisons, Alan Jones and the Ray Hadleys of this world another opportunity to demonize ‘illegals and criminals’.

    There is a persistent myth that refusal of work rights and other penalties will deter new asylum seekers and particularly boat people. But there is no evidence whatsoever that this deterrent works. In almost all cases asylum seekers are escaping appalling conditions, from the Taliban for example. Those situations are far worse than anything that we can throw at them.

    Beyond denial of work rights, there are many other hardships and handicaps forced upon asylum seekers. They often have limited accommodation help and some have no access to Medicare. Under the government’s policy of ‘no advantage”, many could be waiting in the community for five years.

    The ‘support’ arrangements for asylum seekers in the community are chaotic and quite arbitrary. Arja Keski-Nummi and I have described them as Kafkaesque. (See article in publish.pearlsandirritations.com) These arrangements are a mass of contradictions wrapped up in confusion. But one thing the Minister could do, and do quickly, would be to cut through this confusion and allow almost all asylum seekers to work. Taxpayers would benefit. Allowing asylum seekers to work in the community would be far cheaper than keeping them locked up in those hellholes of Immigration Detention Centres. Those centres chew up enormous amounts of money as well as very vulnerable people.

    Historically Labor governments have espoused the dignity of labour and the self-esteem personally and in the community that goes with hard work. Where are those values today?

    Asylum seekers are not criminals. They are courageous people who have taken great risks in escaping persecution for the sake of safety for themselves and their children.  Asylum seekers and particularly their children, become great citizens and contributors to this country.

    Minister, please grasp the nettle and let asylum seekers work. Start a breakthrough in this toxic political approach to asylum seekers .Australia can do better than this. We have shown it in the past

    John Menadue