Transcript
DOMINIC GODFREY:
Australia's right to detain asylum seekers offshore was challenged by human rights lawyers on the grounds that the country's constitution restricted Canberra from acting in other countries in ways contrary to the laws of that country. PNG's Supreme Court ruled last year that detaining people in the Australian run camp was both unconstitutional and illegal. However Australia's High Court found Canberra is not constitutionally limited by a need to conform to the laws of another country. The court's full bench ruled Australia's offshore arrangement with PNG was valid saying, "neither the legislative nor the executive power of Australia is constitutionally limited by any need to conform to the domestic law of another country." The Australian human rights lawyer George Newhouse told me it was disturbing in that the Australian government can undertake illegal acts in other countries provided they're legal under Australia's constitution. He said under PNG's law, people smuggling has been declared unconstitutional but not under Australian.
JB: So beneath all this legal interpretation, what's actually been happening on Manus itself?
DG: Well detainees are into their third week of protests against Australia's systematic and deliberate strategy of the degradation of living conditions in the camp. They're maintaining their daily 2pm vigil to peacefully highlight the worsening conditions being imposed in the camp.
JB: How are these conditions worsening?
DG: Australian authorities have been progressively cutting electricity and water supply to the camp making life profoundly more difficult for the detainees in an attempt to coerce them into the Manus community.
JB: What's the strategy here?
DG: Australia has a duty of care to the men of the Manus camp which has been acknowledged by Prime Minister Turnbull in a recently released transcript of a telephone conversation earlier this year with US President Donald Trump. If Australia can move these men out of the camp and into the community, Canberra can absolve themselves of responsibility to them. They're attempting to have the camp closed by the 31st of October. Australian human rights lawyer George Newhouse calls it, "a deliberate and evil strategy to distance itself from responsibility for the men of Manus."
JB: Is there any good news?
DG: Well there are reports US authorities are again on Manus to continue vetting detainees for possible resettlement in America. Kurdish journalist Behrouz Boochani, one of the detainees, tweeted that US Homeland Security officials are there. The Trump regime at the start of 2017 agreed it would honour the deal originally brokered between the Obama and Turnbull offices last year. But really that's about as good as it gets. Five men have died in the camp in the four years of its operation, Hamed Shamshiripour in recent weeks. There are reports of regular assaults and beatings of detainees by locals in the township of Lorengau. The locals clearly don't want the men. Another asylum seeker was reportedly medivacced to Brisbane last week after sustaining serious head injuries during one of these altercations. Australian officials are refusing to comment.
