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Asylum immigrants - Green Light

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An apt letter to "The Australian" today following the blackmail of asylum seekers re their threats of self harm when rescued by a merchant ship which intended to take them to an Indonesian port.
If an aircraft pilot were coerced by a passenger to change direction and land at a different airport, the passenger would be charged with hijacking the aircraft.

Why isn't the same standard applied to boat people?
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Julia said:
An apt letter to "The Australian" today following the blackmail of asylum seekers re their threats of self harm when rescued by a merchant ship which intended to take them to an Indonesian port.
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This has happened on other occassions under Labor, therefore it is obviously deemed as acceptable behaviour.
 
I couldn't agree more with Alexander Downer's article today. Exactly what many of us have been saying.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/nat...spect-in-jakarta/story-e6frgd0x-1226677876352

Rudd sold out our national interests and lost respect in Jakarta

THE best international bilateral relationships are based on mutual respect. We acknowledge their issues and sensitivities and they acknowledge ours. And between the two we try to sort it all out.

Well, for the past 5 1/2 years the Australian government hasn't applied this principle to our relationship with Indonesia. Instead, it has lurched between reckless self-interest and fawning deference towards our largest neighbour. Not surprisingly, the results have not been good.

The government recklessly cut off some of Indonesia's food supply by banning live cattle exports, all on the back of a television program. The result is it not only unnecessarily antagonised Indonesia but we've lost much of that valuable trade.

Then there's the issue of people-smuggling. Let's state the obvious. The Australian government has spectacularly failed to harness the help of Indonesia to close down people-smuggling and protect our borders.

This is the most dramatic failure of Australian diplomacy since Gough Whitlam gave president Suharto a wink and a nod in Townsville in 1975 to invade East Timor.

During the Howard years the Indonesians told us on several occasions they thought the people-smuggling issue was our problem, not theirs.

I didn't accept that. The Indonesians were up to their necks in the issue. Indonesian-flagged boats with Indonesian crews were bringing people illegally and for money to our shores.

I told them we were going to stop it. It was then, as it is now, a problem in our relationship that had to be fixed. At no time did I seek Indonesia's permission to protect my own country's borders. We have every right to protect our borders and we don't need anyone's permission to do so.

We adopted a policy of zero tolerance of people arriving illegally on our shores, especially in rickety Indonesian fishing boats. We refused to let the Tampa land people in Australia and as an extension of that policy we did turn back boats when we could.

In protecting our borders we treated our great neighbour with respect. We kept the Indonesians fully informed about our actions. We didn't mislead or deceive them. But never, never, ever did we ask another country's permission to protect our borders. No self-respecting government would do that. Ever.

And it worked. The boats stopped, the integrity of our immigration scheme was restored and our relationship with Indonesia went through a golden era. We learned to help each other.

The then Indonesian foreign minister, Hassan Wirajuda, and I set up the Bali process to develop regional co-operation on people-smuggling. We worked with the Indonesian authorities to track down the people-smugglers and break up their cartels. We helped the Indonesian police and intelligence agencies track down and stamp out terrorism. We gave them $1 billion to help with the reconstruction of Aceh after the tsunami in 2004.

I'll never forget President Yudhoyono taking my hand in both of his and, with tears in his eyes, saying he would never forget Australia's generosity and help. It was a moving moment. He made me shed a tear as well.

We jointly set up another regional process to counter terrorism. We even jointly set up a regional inter-faith dialogue in the wake of the Bali bombings.

It all seems a long time ago now. Terrorism hasn't returned but the boats have become an armada and hundreds of lives have been lost. It's heartbreaking to see all our good work undone by Kevin Rudd, the global master of playing cynical domestic politics.

If John Howard had rung me and asked if he should sign a joint communique with Indonesia saying we would never act unilaterally to protect our borders I would have told him it would be a sell-out of our national interest. It would be weak and fawning. You don't win respect signing documents like that. But that's hypothetical. Howard, a patriot if ever there were one, wouldn't have countenanced signing such a document.

In one of his first acts after returning as prime minister, Rudd did just that. No one in Canberra said it but I would have: it was weak, cynical domestic politics. Rudd sold out our national interests and in doing so won applause from the press gallery but lost respect in Jakarta. In 1975 Labor sold out East Timor to Jakarta and left us with a bloody mess to sort out. Since 2007, Rudd has done a similar thing, but this time he has sold out Australia, not little East Timor.

The government has made a huge mistake signalling it won't turn back the boats no matter how hard that may be.

It sends a simple message. We'll use the navy to facilitate the arrival of the boats, not to protect our borders. No wonder they keep coming. We are helping them, not stopping them.

It's heartbreaking for me to watch all this. Rudd has undone all the good work we did and the best he has come up with is a new regional conference. We already have a regional process in place, the Bali process.

And a last thought: how come our Foreign Minister isn't trying to fix this up? He spends his time on Twitter and Facebook. He's the Foreign Minister: his job is to solve problems, not play with his iPad. It's as sad as it is pathetic.

Alexander Downer was foreign minister from 1996 to 2007.
 
From the article above,

The government has made a huge mistake signalling it won't turn back the boats no matter how hard that may be.

It sends a simple message. We'll use the navy to facilitate the arrival of the boats, not to protect our borders. No wonder they keep coming. We are helping them, not stopping them.
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To the above, I would add that this just ups the price Indonesia will demand to ultimately do their part. Their government I imagine would be laughing at a neighbour that seeks to negotiate itself into an ever worse position for it's own ideological stupidity and short term domestic political gain.
 
sails said:
Excellent article - thanks for posting it, Bellenuit!
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drsmith said:
To the above, I would add that this just ups the price Indonesia will demand to ultimately do their part. Their government I imagine would be laughing at a neighbour that seeks to negotiate itself into an ever worse position for it's own ideological stupidity and short term domestic political gain.
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+1 to both above endorsements.

Thinking about Alexander Downer, one of his pretty competent colleagues was Phillip Ruddock whom I understand is still in Parliament. Shouldn't he be brought back to the Front Bench?
 
With Kevin Rudd darting off to Indonesia and now PNG, Labor has chalked up another fine achievement (cough) while in office, that being over 1000 boat arrivals in a week.

12 boats carrying 1156 passengers to the week ending Friday July 12. This compares to 3 boats carrying 76 passengers for the same period last year.

12/07/2013 Border Protection Command assists vessel
11/07/2013 Border Protection Command assists vessel
11/07/2013 Border Protection Command assists vessel
10/07/2013 Border Protection Command assists vessel
09/07/2013 Border Protection Command intercepts vessel
09/07/2013 Border Protection Command assists vessel
08/07/2013 Border Protection Command intercepts vessel
08/07/2013 AFP and ACBPS detects vessel
07/07/2013 Border Protection Command assists vessel
07/07/2013 Border Protection Command assists vessel
06/07/2013 Border Protection Command assists vessel
06/07/2013 Border Protection Command assists vessel

10/07/2012 Customs and Border Protection intercepts vessel
08/07/2012 Customs and Border Protection and Australian Federal Police intercept vessel
06/07/2012 Border Protection Command intercepts vessel
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http://www.jasonclare.com.au/media/portfolio-releases/home-affairs-and-justice-releases.html
 
As Bolt says;

The question is actually very simple:

Who should decide whether we accept Indonesian boats smuggling in illegal immigrants and purported “asylum seekers” - Indonesia or Australia?

Well, then.

Indonesia is merely haggling over the price of its agreement to what we are perfectly entitled to do.
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You can't argue with this.
 
They are now arriving from Vietnam. Seems a pretty long time since that country was unsafe.:(
 
Jakarta won't dictate our policy on boats: Coalition

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/nat...-boats-coalition/story-fn9hm1gu-1226679989441

INDONESIA would have no right of veto over any Coalition policy to deter asylum-seekers, Scott Morrison has declared.

The opposition immigration spokesman today accused Kevin Rudd of “contracting away” Australia's ability to decide how to stop boat arrivals, as both sides of politics seized on mixed messages from Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa about the Coalition's policy of turning back asylum-seeker boats.

“I am concerned that Bob Carr and Kevin Rudd are happy to just hand those decisions over, effectively provide a right of veto over Australia's national policies on these issues,” Mr Morrison told ABC radio.

“Now that is not something a Coalition government would ever agree to,” he said.



It's about time someone called a spade a spade (and showed some common sense).
 
dutchie said:
“Now that is not something a Coalition government would ever agree to,” he said.
It's about time someone called a spade a spade (and showed some common sense).
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Exactly. And Mr Morrison is doing it in spades. He is one of the shadow ministers making up for his leader's deficiencies.
 
explod said:
The past is in the past, what is the solution going forward?
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The Noalition and their supporters aren't interested in the future, just the past...turn back the clock, turning back the boats, turn back carbon pricing, turn back the NBN.

Tony demands that Rudd do something about the boats yet when given the opportunity wont do anything himself.
 
So_Cynical said:
Tony demands that Rudd do something about the boats yet when given the opportunity wont do anything himself.
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I don't know how you can in any conscience make such a silly statement. The Coalition are in opposition.
They can't do anything. It's entirely up to the government to fix the mess they have created by dismantling the successful Pacific Solution.

The Coalition has spelled out very clearly what they will do if they win government.

I know we have to look at everything you say in the light of your uncritical devotion to Labor, but you need to just think a bit more objectively about what you're saying.
 
explod said:
So how are the Libs going to stop the boats and loss of life?

The past is in the past, what is the solution going forward?
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Don't worry.

After having started them again, Kev the miracle worker is going to stop the boats, perhaps just like he terminated the carbon tax. :rolleyes:

Three prongs I read. In the right place, that might get them back to Indonesia in a single yelp.

Mr Abbott said he was more than happy to put partisanship aside and support Labor in making the changes needed to stop the boats.

"Bring back the parliament, let's debate this issue and let's make the changes now to stop the boats," he said in Mackay, Queensland.
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Now, let's see the substance.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/new...to-administrator/story-fn3dxiwe-1226680522893
 

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