The United Nations High Commissioner for Human
Rights Navi Pillay has expressed concern at Australia's new policy of
returning Sri Lankan asylum seekers home immediately from the detention
centers in Nauru and Manus islands.
Ms. Pillay who is in Bali, Indonesia attending the Bali Democracy Forum
has said that she was concerned at the policy Australia enacted after
August 13 this year to detain illegal migrants in offshore detention
centers for a long time.
''I am highly concerned that detention in regional offshore processing
centres such as in Nauru could result in indefinite detention and other
human rights violations,'' she has said.
Speaking of returning Sri Lankan asylum seekers immediately after they
embarked in islands belonged to Australia, Ms. Pillay has said that "Sri
Lanka was still volatile, despite the end of the civil war in 2009."
"Now that was a conflict area, matters have not stabilised as yet. All
the reports reaching me are that people are concerned over controls
being imposed over them,'' she has been quoted as saying.
''So I can understand if they'd be leaving out of fear or for their
personal security, and it really cries out for all the refugee
protections, asylum seeker protections to be made particularly
applicable to them,'' she has said.
Backing Australia's policy the International Organization for Migration
(IOM) recently said that some Sri Lankans arriving by boat in Australia
are economic migrants not refugees.
Since the Australian government's new rules came into effect on August
13, Australia has deported voluntarily and involuntarily 186 Sri Lankans
home.
Australian Minister for Immigration and Citizenship Chris Bowen has said
that those asylum seekers had not raised any issues that engaged
Australia's international obligations.
The IOM is assisting the Australian government to return the Sri Lankan
asylum seekers, who have expressed desire to return home rather than
being sent to detention centers in Nauru and Manus Island.
People returning voluntarily receive an integration assistance package
from the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the
involuntary deportees do not have access to reintegration assistance.
Source:http://www.colombopage.com
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