Tags
asylum seekers, Australia, Australian Labor Party, authoritarianism, democracy, dictatorship, Mahinda Rajapaksa, nationalism, people smugglers, politics, racism, refugees, Sri Lanka, xenophobia
I guess it was inevitable. Eventually when you come from a country with markèd instability and a rising dictator, refugees are going to start leaving. And when refugees start leaving, Australia gets up in arms about “those people” coming here. And eventually one of “those people” will commit a crime like raping a Macquarie University student. And then it’s all over.
Sri Lanka is a parliamentary democracy with a president as head of state. Supposedly a democracy. Democracy has eroded over the years and now we are in the grips of the worst upcoming dictator since Sri Lankan independence. Mahinda Rajapaksa is murdering journalists, the political opposition and “suspected criminals”. Various bizarre social policies are being enacted to promote the nationalistic interests of Sinhala Buddhists who make up roughly 70% of the population of 21 million.
This man, who has links to Iran‘s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, had links to Libya‘s Muammar Gaddafi and has been condemned broadly by the UN and Commonwealth heads of state… is the Australian Federal Government‘s latest collaborator!!! Yes, he’s helping us with refugees!!!
Because sending people back to a place like Sri Lanka is a wonderful idea, so is colluding with its despot to do so, as is refusing to even consider the well-documented and legitimate asylum claims of highly educated professionals. Never mind the fact that the despotic government that the Federal Government is colluding with is known to be some of these “people smugglers”.
This is bizarre policy. I can only assume that the reason for this incompetence is a mixture of attempting to manipulate the media, play on innate racism and fear of immigration and having a very short-term view of appropriate regional politics.
I suppose the United States, our laudable ally, has a grand history of colluding with Saddam Hussein, the Taliban, Saudi Arabia the Shah of Iran and other such Great Leaders.
Related articles
- Australia is playing a dangerous game with Sri Lanka | Stewart Motha (guardian.co.uk)
- Boycott Sri Lanka, Robertson urges (smh.com.au)
- Man ‘put hand down PJs of student’ (dailytelegraph.com.au)
- Victim forgotten in witch hunt against asylum seekers (abc.net.au)
- Australia denies asylum to Sri Lankan editor facing government death threats (smh.com.au)
- Asylum denied, a penalty waits at home (smh.com.au)
- Blow to asylum battle as intelligence links Sri Lankan official to smugglers (theaustralian.com.au)