Off the wire
• Tokyo shares end higher by break  • Costa Rica to host festival of stone spheres  • Aussie PM faces uphill campaign battle after election announcement  • Aussie PM defends government climate policies in wake of coal protests  • Paraguay's students demand better education, schools  • Filipinos head to polls to elect new president  • China Hushen 300 index futures open lower Monday  • China treasury bond futures open higher Monday  • Panama to transfer 3,400 stranded Cuban migrants to Mexico  • S. Korean woman suspected of contracting Zika in Vietnam  
You are here: 　 Home

Fate of Australia's illegal PNG immigration detention center may take months to resolve: minister

Xinhua, May 9, 2016 Adjust font size:

Australian officials have held "constructive" talks with their Papua New Guinean counterparts about the future of the controversial immigration center on Manus Island, though it may take months for the issue to be resolved.

Though the number of asylum seekers trying to reach Australian shores pales in comparison to those that are attempting to enter Europe, Papua New Guinea (PNG) hosts one of two Australian offshore immigration processing centers. The other is on the pacific island of Nauru.

PNG Prime Minister Peter O'Neill has said the center is to be closed following a Supreme Court ruling the original memorandum of understanding establishing the arrangement was unconstitutional, and hence the asylum seeker detention was illegal. O'Neill did not give a timeframe for when the center was to be closed.

Australian minister for immigration Peter Dutton told reporters in Brisbane on Monday it "will take a couple of months to sort through the legal issue" following emergency talks between PNG and Australian officials last week.

"We will have what I think will be detailed and long-run discussion with PNG to help them in relation to this particular issue," Dutton said.

Australia and PNG claim the other is responsible for settling the some 850 asylum seekers.

Lawyers for the detained asylum seekers late last week filed an injunction in Australia's high court aiming to halt their potential transfer to Australia's other center on the tiny pacific island of Nauru which has been subject to self immolation protests over the past fortnight.

A 23-year-old Iranian man tragically died and a Somali woman remains in critical condition in an Australian hospital after they set themselves alight in protest of the harsh conditions at the Nauru center, which has been subject to reports of systemic child abuse and rape.

The United Nations and international NGOs have consistently criticized Australia's controversial boat turn back policy and associated offshore processing, with the latest developments bringing an un-welcome light on politically sensitive immigration policies.

Dutton also revealed three groups of boat-arriving asylum seekers had been returned to their home countries this year, the latest being a group of 12 men, woman and children from Sri Lanka who were spotted near the Cocos Islands last week, and returned on May 6.

"They were in a good state -- they had made the journey down and they quickly made the journey back," Dutton said.

Australia's controversial boat turn back -- where safe to do so -- and offshore processing policies were adopted in 2013, designed to stop the flow of asylum seekers using people smuggling operations to reach Australia's mainland by boat following a spate of tragic deaths at sea.

Government authorities steadfastly maintain those attempting to reach the mainland by boat will never be resettled in Australia. Endit