Smell the flowers. Image by Webdiary artist Martin Davies. www.daviesart.com

A couple of weeks ago, I visited the detention centre in Port Hedland and met some of the people there. Like many Webdiary readers, I’ve been kept informed of the plight of those held there through numerous e-mails, faxes, letters and the occasional media report. I have learned from those detained, and their friends and supporters, of the grinding monotony and hopelessness which is their daily bread. I thought I had at least an elementary understanding of how distressing such prolonged incarceration might be, especially to those who had already experienced persecution and torture.

 

But I was not prepared for what I saw when I finally set foot behind the barbed wire that contains the asylum seekers’ lives. While they have valiantly tried to make the incarceration more tolerable by painting murals and flags on the outside walls, by planting gardens and decorating their airless rooms, nothing can disguise the palpable air of despair.

Their lives are controlled by the dictates of others; every move in the compound is monitored and their transition from one section to another controlled by the ACM guards, to whom there are polite and deferential.

I spoke with mothers fretful and tearful about their bleak prospects but struggling to maintain a facade of optimism and cheerfulness in the presence of their children. The Iranian men I had arranged to meet all faced imminent deportation under the MOU signed by the Australian government with the regime still described as part of the “Axis of Evil”. They were subdued but firm that they would not accept the government’s “package” and return to Iran. I will never forget the hurt in their eyes, their despondency; strung between never ending internment here and certain punishment if there are returned to Iran.

I have never felt so totally useless. I could offer them no real hope that the government could be persuaded to change the decision to forcibly expel them from Australia. They begged me to urge the Minister at least to assist them to gain asylum in some third country more willing than Australia to help them rebuild their lives. They were as one in insisting that they cannot go back to Iran – one said that it wouldn’t matter if he was offered $200,000 instead of $2000; he would not go back because his life is forfeit if he does.

The government, of course, has made it quite clear that they will take no responsibility for the fate of those sent back once they step off the plane in Teheran. In reply to a Question on Notice, Ruddock said:

The Australian Government… respects the principles of state sovereignty and does not monitor non-Australian citizens in foreign countries.

In The Age last week, Russell Skelton revealed that inquiries in Tehran confirmed that “returning Iranians who fled the country illegally are automatically charged with immigration offences and interrogated at length”. He also confirmed what many of those in Port Hedland already know – that returnees are often held for several days at airport detention cells where they are interrogated and that political and religious dissidents face further investigation and possible charges in religious courts. They also know that many are beaten, tortured and executed.

Some of the Afghani Hazaras living in Albany in Western Australia who fled the mother-robbed, fanatical Taliban have just learned that they face a similarly uncertain future – they are to be sent back to Afghanistan, the first of the Afghan refugees to learn their fate. They were previously recognised as genuine refugees and granted Temporary Protection Visas when they arrived in Australia over three years ago. Many were the victims of persecution simply because they belong to a racial minority.

The minister’s decision to revoke their refugee status and send them back flies in the face of international law and the worsening situation in Afghanistan; the government is ignoring repeated warnings – and evidence – that the Taliban are again in control of a number of areas of the country. The UNHCR and Amnesty International have both been urging countries not to send refugees back. It is would be particularly dangerous for this group of Hazara Afghans to be sent back, since they have been persecuted by successive regimes, including the Taliban Regime, and are still targeted by groups associated with the Taliban. One man told DIMIA his family reported being visited by known associates of the Taliban warning they know he is coming back. DIMIA have refused to accept this information as valid unless he provides their names, something he clearly cannot do.

Last weekend the Minister also ordered a number of Iranian refugees to be forcibly deported to Iran, against the advice of Human Rights groups. One of these men was intercepted at the UAE by Iranian Intelligence agents and is yet to be heard from. There are other confirmed cases of people being held in the notorious Evin prison on their return to Iran. It is unspeakable that Minister Ruddock can knowingly send these people back to fate of poverty and certain persecution, and is contrary to the spirit of the Refugee Convention.

I saw the chilling realisation of their fears in Port Hedland in the form of the refurbished Juliet block, the notorious isolation block used in the past to subdue the dissenters, the angry and distressed. No expense has been spared in transforming Juliet block into a maximum-security prison within a prison. The majority of the thirty plus cells are identical with cells normally reserved in the prison system for the most serious offenders. They are complete with massive, soundproof doors, peepholes, toilets and video surveillance and have been designed to eliminate hanging points. Family units on the upper floor invalidate the claim that the centre is simply for managing people threatening self-harm.

I think it is likely that these cells have been built to house those who are to be forcibly returned to Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan. I believe those to be deported will be separated from the larger compound (transported from other centres) and held in the prison cells until they are forced to board flights to their countries of origin, places they fled in terror. The Minister has already confirmed that those Iranians who refuse to leave peacefully will be handcuffed, removed by force and escorted back to Iran, where they will be handed to police and immigration authorities.

This is unspeakable cruelty. And many of our fellow citizens find it just.