Asylum Seekers Australia

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Illegal immigrant, illegal alien, boat person, queue jumper. What do you imagine when you hear these words? A spectre of rusty boats encroaching on the horizon, intruding on our careless Australian way of life. But in fact, these men, women and children fleeing oppression and terror are not illegal immigrants. According to the UN refugee agency, an illegal immigrant is someone who has moved from one state to another without any legal claim, such as a visa. All of the people on these boats are asylum seekers which means they are complying with Australian law and UN protocol. In the words of our current prime minister Julia Gillard. "For people to say they're anxious about border security doesn't make them intolerant. It certainly doesn't…show more content…
In comparison around 50,000 people over-stayed their visa last year alone, 298,800 came with a time limited visa and 171,320 came as migrants with permanent residency. The fact is Australia only accepts 0.6% of the world’s refugees and at the current rate of refugee arrivals it would take 20 years to fill the MCG. Most of the people that seek asylum in Australia are from Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Zimbabwe, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan and China. Raj, a Sri Lankan Tamil man fled his home in Trincomalee in eastern Sri Lanka because he says ‘the island is a living hell for the 3.8 million Tamils who live there’. ''The situation in Sri Lanka is still dangerous. Women are still being raped. My friends are still being arrested,’’ ‘‘There is no media freedom there - the media and international organisations are not allowed into certain areas. The world doesn't know what's really happening there.'' Many asylum seekers come from countries like Iraq and Afghanistan where there is no United Nations High Commissions for Refugees office and no Australian embassy. Sometimes in countries like Afghanistan, simply expressing a desire to leave puts your life at…show more content…
The purpose of this is to bar asylum seekers from the refugee status determination system that applies on the mainland under Australian law. Instead, they go through a ‘non-statutory’ process governed by guidelines that are not legally binding. They have no access to the Refugee Review Tribunal and very limited access to the Australian courts. They must rely on a non-compellable and non-reviewable Ministerial discretion to be allowed to apply for a protection visa. Prolonged and indefinite detention and temporary protection visas have been shown to damage the mental health of already traumatised
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