RAC has either organised or taken part in well over 20 major rallies and protests in the past year, as well as regular stalls and speakouts. There are separate pages covering the M.V. Tampa affair and the Woomera trip; here is a selection from the remainder.
Seven activists scaled the walls and staged a rooftop protest at the Maribyrnong camp in thunder and pouring rain on Wednesday 24 Jan, at 3.30pm. Besides boosting morale inside the camp, their action attracted considerable publicity gave much-neded impetus to the campaign.
The protesters were able to publicise a list of demands, which included:
A public meeting at Trades Hall on 20 February 2001 attracted a marvellous attendance of about 270 people, who heard speaker after speaker condemn the government's shameful treatment of asylum seekers, with vivid and harrowing accounts of individual refugees' experiences. The meeting ended with the launch of the Statement by George Lekakis from the Ethnic Communities' Council of Victoria, followed by a performance by the Melbourne Workers' Theatre Rapid Response Team, featuring Immigration Minister Ruddock himself in the hot seat.
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The new RAC Mobile Detention Centre made its debut at M1 - the original centre figured in the Brunswick Street Fair in March but didn't survive the experience. It was first set up near the Stock Exchange and was then carried along with the march, ending at the Nike store, attracting attention all the way and providing a focus for refugee activists. The new RAC banner was also prominent, as well as the RAC t-shirt.
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Philip Ruddock, the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs, was due to address a forum, entitled "Refugees in Australia : Key Ethical and Practical Issues" held by The University of Melbourne Centre for Public Policy on 7 May 2001. RAC and other groups, including No One Is Illegal, organised a protest rally outside the building to display disgust at the treatment of refugees by the current government, in particular the mandatory detention regime and the use of temporary visas with limited rights, and Philip Ruddock's scapegoating of refugees. In the event, the forum was called off when he backed out, but the protest went ahead.
Amnesty hosted the Mother's Day vigil at the Maribyrnong Detention Centre, and a total of up to 150 people, including many children, brought flowers to send in to the mothers inside. At first the response from the ACM management was not very forthcoming, but in the end it was agreed the police would collect flowers left at the gate and take them back into the centre for distribution. No-one was actually allowed to enter the place, of course. Early arrivals were amazed to see a convoy of police reinforcements arrive, including horses. Apparently alarm bells had rung somewhere. Still, the animals got a bit of exercise in the back yard, and it was a beautiful day.
The organisers got people to arrange flowers on and in front of the wire fence, and this formed a backdrop to the speakers. Then some of the children headed a procession to the main gate, where the flowers were pushed under the wire, and Dr Andrew Theophanous addressed the crowd.while he was speaking, three police officers came up and loaded the flowers into a car.
To round things off, many of those present then walked round to the back of the compound and let loose a few rousing choruses of "It's Mother's Day today, Let them put to play!" and "Lock up Ruddock, Free the refugees!" Hopefully the volume was enough to carry over into the detainees' quarters.
Here are extracts from some of the speeches:
"Over the last few years I've developed strong bonds with some of the mothers inside, and what they've been through has been horrific. A lot of the women have been tortured in their countries, raped, sexually abused, they have been sex-slaves for many years. And they arrive in Australia and they're out in detention ...
"One mother is currently in detention with her six children, all aged between 1 and 18. She .. gave birth to one of her children in detention. She celebrated ... her first birthday last week, and that signifies 1 year in prison ..."
Testimony of a mother with a teenaged daughter in detention:
"She (her daughter) has become withdrawn and depressed - I feel so helpless and frustrated because there is little or nothing I can do to help her change her situation. At times she calls out these strange comments that I can't fathom. I can fell guilty because I too find it really hard to cope and I too get depressed ..." (Dana, from Amnesty)
"Our Aboriginal sisters and brothers who used to freely roam this land 45000 years ago would rise from their graves if they knew that in 2001 there are men and women who are in prison only because they want to live in a free country like Australia.
"Australia's biggest shame we all agree is the inability of this government to say sorry to the Aboriginal people, the original inhabitants of Australia. I say to you that Australia's second biggest shame is the continued detention of women and children whose only fault is coming here illegally to flee oppressive regimes.
"This national government, whose public face on immigration matters is Minister Philip Ruddock, has unashamedly abandoned Australia's noble post WW2 reputation for humane and decent treatment of refugees. It's policy of detaiing asylum seekers to pretect its borders from illegal immigration is being implemented with such callousmness that [it is] violating the human rights of women and their children ...
"We probably have the worst immigration system in the world" (Melba, from the Victorian Immigrant and Refugee Women's Coalition)
"How can a legal person ... become illegal?
"They are known as numbers rather than as names and persons ... so if a mother wants to get something for a child her number us called out, not a name." (Nasra, from the Victorian Immigrant and Refugee Women's Coalition)
"Many of us today, many Australians, are descended from mothers and grandmothers who were boast people .... 600 000 Australians benefitted from some type of humanitarian visa over the last 50 years, and then when you consider the families of these people - it's ridiculous that now the government would have such a punitive approach to the boat people.
"Refugees don't choose to become refugees. They are forced to leave their homelands. The people that we are talking about here today have come from Iraq, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka ... The government might tell you that they're queue-jumpers. But don't you think your mother would have run for her life rather thatn stand in a queue if she had that choice?" (Georgina, from Amnesty)
"Unfortunately at the moment the policy of mandatory detention is supported by both the goverment and the opposition. This is a very sad thing because Australia is one of the few western countries that actually supports this policy. And I am very pleased to be associated with Amnesty International, the Refugee Council of Australia and all the other organisations that have opposed this policy. And I hope that we will continue to oppose this policy.
"Now today is a very special day because it is Mother's Day and it is significant because a year ago the minister said that he was going to look at a model which would allow the release into the community of women and children - the so-called Swedish model - and he took that quite expensive trip to Sweden and some other countries to have a look. And I'm very sad to say that in fact what has happened is, rather than coming back with an enthusiasm to organise the release of the women and children from the detention centres, what the minister did is he has increasingly tried to debunk the Swedish model and to attempt in every way not to implement a model which would release the women and children.
"Recently I asked a question in Parliament in relation to this matter and in his answer he said to me that he's going to carry out one trial in Woomera, but it's only going to be 25 people - that's total women and children 25 - and this is what he said 'Subject to satisfactory arrangements being agreed with the Woomera community the participants will be located in community housing within Woomera town, but under immigration detention. This is a trial of alternative detention arrangements, not a release into the community.' That's what he said. And in fact what had happened is that every step of this supposed trial is being worked in such a way that it fails, and so that they can turn around and say we can't do this in Australia. But that's not what heppens in Sweden. In Sweden all women and children are given a possibility of release from detention.
"And I say that's what should happen here in Australia. The mandatory detention regime is bad enough - to have mothers and their children in detention for extended periods of time is an outrage, and we have to have a community movement to ensure that both political parties start getting some backbone and saying we've got to do something about the mandatory detention regime. And we're going to do in particular something about women and children in detention.
"Now let me say that someone here called out 'fathers too'. Of course, that is what we want. And that's why I'm against the mandatory detention regime. Because the mandatory detention regime is an absurdity both from an economic, social and humanitarian point of view. It's an absurdity. 95% of the refugees from Iraq are released. By our own tribunals. And if you try to get through that tribunal, it's very hard. Why are they releasing 95% of the people from Iraq? Because they're genuine refugees. that's why. 96% of the people from Afghanistan are being released. So why are they releasing them?[Here the police collected up the flowers from the gate, to applause]( But we want more than just the flowers. We want the release of all people into the community.) What this policy's about, well we might have 2 or 3% of people who might disappear or they might have a problem. Since when do we say, you put 98% in detention because 2% might do something wrong? Imagine if we had that policy across the board. What would happen to our laws and our human rights in this country? We'd probably all be in prison. Now the fact of the matter is that this is a wrong policy and it ought to be changed, and we all ought to work to change it. And especially in relation to the mothers and the children.
"Let me just say one thing that has been mentioned about the temporary protection visas that people have spoken about. I'm proud of the fact that when this dreaded policy came in in November 99 I was the only person in the House of Representatives to speak against it. It's a disgrace, this 3-year policy, and it's been condemned by the United Nations and by international bodies because what we're saying is even after you've been classified as a genuine refugee you can't stay in Australia. You've got to have a 3-year visa. And I've asked the MInister, what happens to these people after 3 years? Three times I've asked him the question. Every time it's waffle. They may be able, he says, to stay permanently. They may be able. Not, they will be able. They may be able. So these people could be faced in three years' time with another 3-year temporary visa or another situation of having to wait and wait for their status to be determined. Now the worst aspect - and lets say this on Mother's Day - about the temporary protection visas is this: you cannot under that visa sponsor your spouse and children to come to Australia. You cannot sponsor them. This constitutes forced separation, forced separation of genuine refugees. So after you get your refugee [status], you get your 3-year visa, if your children, your spouse and children are in Afghanistan or Iraq or languishing in a camp in Pakistan, you cannot bring them to Australia. This is an outrage. And must be ended. And I call upon all of you to help us achieve this goal. Go to your parliamentarians of whatever persuasion and lets get some change in this policy in Australia." (Dr Andrew Theophanous, MP)
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As a prelude to the National Day of Action called for 3 June, No One Is Illegal organised an all-night candlelight vigil outside the State Library in Melbourne, where the rally was due to start the following day. The RAC Mobile Detention Centre was set up and a number of volunteers "imprisoned" behind barbed wire for the night, to be released by popular demand at the start of the June 3 rally. It was a wretched cold and windy night, but the was a good number of visitors to maintain morale.
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At least three thousand people rallied in Melbourne as part of the Refugee Action Collective National Day of Action. Speaker after speaker, including former detainees as well as community leaders, trade unionists, and activist/comedian Rod Quantock, who was MC, condemned the government's racist and inhumane policies, calling for the closure of the detention centres and an end to mandatory detention.
Messages of support from groups overseas were read out to the rally:
From the Committee to Defend Asylum Seekers (UK)We wish you all the very best in your campaign to push back the Australian government's anti-asylum seeker policies.
We in the UK face a similar fight to stop our own government's "get tough" policies - ones which have led to the most gross violations of human rights in peace time Britain.
They are policies which have also allowed room for the reappearance of barbaric levels of racism, with the police recording a 300% increase in racist attacks following anti-asylum seeker speeches by politicians of all parties.
But these same policies, and the racism they have engendered, are producing resistance among a growing minority sickened by the scapegoating of the most vulnerable people in our societies.
We are confident that, through unity, we can confront and turn back government policy and stop the racists.
From colleagues in The Netherlands:
"Dear friends in Australia,"We send you this message as a sign of our solidarity with your actions on 3 June against the Australian government's treatment of asylum seekers.
"No one can solve the problem of refugees and others asking for our protection arriving in our 'Western' countries through deporting all those who cannot prove their legal status. We protest against the weakening of the principles of the Geneva Convention. Detaining people who have committed no crime is against all general principles and fundamental rights.
"UNITED will continue to demand the closing of detention centers for asylum seekers and "unwanted foreigners" and the legalisation of so-called "Sans-Papiers". Since 1993 UNITED monitors deaths that result from the policies of "Fortress Europe". More than 2300 people have died trying to cross borders, committing suicide in detention centres, or after being deported back to a country that is not safe for them.
"We wish you strength and good luck for your work. Don't ever feel that you are completely alone in your struggle!
Kind regards,[UNITED for Intercultural Action
European network against nationalism, racism, fascism
and in support of migrants and refugees
PB 413, NL-1000 AK Amsterdam
phone +31-20-6834778, fax +31-20-6834582
[email protected]
http://www.unitedagainstracism.org]
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The first vigil of the new season was organised by RAC-West and was attended by about 40-50 people - a good number even without allowing for the miserable weather. But as one of the speakers pointed out, standing outside the camp for an hour or so in miserable weather is one thing, but life inside the camp is immeasurably worse. Several people were there for the first time, and many were clearly shocked by what they saw and heard. Amongst the many speakers were Arun Pradhan and John Tully from RAC-West, Jorge Jorquera, Socialist Alliance candidate for Gellibrand, Pamela Curr and Damien Lawson from No One Is Illegal, and Sarah, representing a group of students from Princes Hill Secondary College. At the end of the rally proper, several people took advantage of an open gate to get right up to the wire near the exercise yard, and were able to talk to men inside the building, while police looked on - until ACM staff insisted they close the windows.
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In spite of extremely short notice, there was an impressive response to a call to action from No One Is Illegal over the government's refusal to allow the Tampa to land its cargo of rescued asylum seekers on Christmas Island. For more on this issue, see the separate M.V.Tampa page.
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Kites are banned at Woomera - plastic bags turned into toys for children are obviously too serious a threat to the territorial integrity of Australia. For this week's vigil at Maribyrnong, No One Is Illegal called on people to come and fly kites outside the camp in solidarity with the detainees and those at Woomera and elsewhere. About thirty people turned out in good kite-flying conditions. Speakers included Pamela Curr, Damien Lawson and Kylie Wilkinson, who led the kite making. The vigil ended as usual with some rousing chanting, with a clearly audible response from within.
One thing that caught the eye was the stockpile of razor wire ready for the new fence already partially constructed around the camp. More than one of those present found it hard to believe this was happening in Australia.
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Over a hundred people turned out for the rally called by RAC in support of the Bedraei family featured in the recent Four Corners program and now threatened with imminent deportation. Unlike the rally last Wednesday, there was also a noticeable police presence, and the media were prominent. The Tampa crisis may have played a part there? But most important was the number of people who came to express their outrage at events and get involved with the campaigns. The organisers of the Woomera bus trip, in particular, are being swamped with enquiries and bookings. Not that they are complaining ...
While the rally was in progress the news came of the lifting of the Federal Court injunction that had been preventing removal of the asylum seekers on board M.V.Tampa, but we also got more encouraging news regarding the Bedraei family - they are safe for at least a few weeks, pending an appeal hearing by the full bench of the Federal Court in NSW.
In addition to speeches by, amongst others, Labor Senator Barney Cooney, ACTU president Sharan Burrow, and representatives of RAC, No One Is Illegal, The Greens, Socialist Alliance,and the Iranian community, we were also able to hear a letter read out from the refugees on board the Tampa, addressed to the Australian People.
At the end of the rally at DIMA, those who could went on up to the Exhibition Buildings to tell the Prime Minister, John Howard, exactly what they thought of his policies. Vigorous chanting drowned his flag-waving speech. A RAC supporter who was there with a camera has contributed a touching photo of an indignant John Howard fan ...
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The Batman Branch of Socialist Alliance held a "Free the Refugees" rally at Preston market in wintry conditions on 8 September. Among the speakers were the S.A. candidate in the forthcoming federal election, Jackie Lynch, and Marg Jacobs from RAC-Darebin. The response was overwhelmingly positive, belying the government's strident propaganda. The RAC mobile detention centre attracted attention as usual, though it had to compete with a fine banner from the Alliance.
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"No to War, No to Racism" was the theme of a rally and speakout called by RAC and the Wills Branch of Socialist Alliance in the Victoria St Mall, Coburg, on Saturday 29 September.
Among the many speakers who joined local candidate David Glanz in condemning the government and opposition's common policy of support for US warmongering on the one hand, and the demonising of asylum seekers on the other, was refugee Mohammed Aljanabi, himself a former inmate of the infamous Woomera camp. Mohammed spoke in Arabic: here is a slightly edited version of the English text of his speech, as read to the rally by RAC's Judy McVey:(to download a copy of this speech in .doc format click here)
Good afternoon. My name is Mohammed Aljanabi. I'd like to welcome you all here. Today I am going to tell you about my experience and about detention centres.
I was in Woomera Detention Centre for seven months.
Firstly there are many problems in [the] Middle East like governments persecuting their people, a lot of people sent to jail for a long time, some of them never coming back, like my brother: he was taken away 21 years ago. at the moment I don't know where he is, [whether] he is alive or no. I am not just talking about myself, there are many people like me.
And another problem [is the] economic embargo against the Iraqi people. It has [been in force for] 11 years against the Iraqi people. This situation has forced and pushed too many people to flee their own country and become refugees, leaving behind them their families and beloved ones. I left Iraq 10 years ago to Jordan, then to Turkey, then to Iran, then to Pakistan, and [then]I came back to Iran again. I moved between those countries from jail to jail, from crisis to crisis, sometimes I had no place to live and sometimes I had no food to eat myself. Then [the] Iranian government pushed us to leave their country or they [would] send us back to Iraq, and I decided to come to Australia.
And the sad tragedy started again in Australia when many refugees have ridden rough seas risking their lives seeking [a] peaceful haven in this country which is ruled by laws. Why [has] Australia locked [people] up in camps. In Woomera desert we have lost human rights, not being able to get in touch or make contact with our families. In addition [there is] psychological war against us, like 'you don't deserve living in Australia,' or 'you are not welcome.' And the media and human rights organisations' representatives are forbidden to have access to these camps, and many times they told us that [the] Australian people rejected [us]. I want to say "Who is [really] from Australia?". We know that Captain Cook discovered this country: if there is one who has a right to live in this country it is the Aboriginies. All of us, we know where we came from: different countries - England, France, Italy, Greece, Spain, Iraq, Egypt, Africa, Germany. We should be here like brothers and sisters.In Woomera Detention Centre they told is 'next month you will have [a] visa, and next month finished and they said again next month, they want just to keep us for a long time without any reason. And after six months we broke out of the detention centre. We called 'we want freedom.' We stayed in Woomera town for two days. It was too cold . We stayed without any food or drink and we won. We took our freedom.
And after that a few refugees were granted temporary visas for three years, which is practically a sort of compulsory supervised residency. They are deprived of the very basic human rights. They are not allowed [access] to the family reunion scheme or travel. We sincerely wonder what does this temporary visa mean? And what will happen to us after three years? Are we going to be sent back to the country of violence, of wars and serious danger of death? Or are we going to be kept again in detention centres?
America wants to start a third world war. It has become [a situation of] all people homeless, hungry, and more refugees. Do you know what war means? It means killing, displacement, homelessness. I'd like to say no war, no to racism.
In conclusion I would like to say do you know what it means [when] someone has no country, or he has lost his country, or he feels no safety in his country? Do you know what it means [when] someone has lost his identity? He lives from country to another country, from jail to jail, he can't reach his family.
I leave all these questions to you. Thank you.
Top of PageRAC had planned to set up the Mobile Detention Centre at today's (Wednesday's) rally in the City Square, but a certain Superintendent Ian Winn, backed up several heavies, made it his business to prevent this. RAC supporters were nonetheless active distributing leaflets in the large crowd. The rally marched to Parliament House via DIMA at Casselden Place, where RAC speaker Sarah addressed the still-large crowd:
There was only a small turnout for the rally to protest at the now-completed removal of asylum-seekers from the Manoora, but RAC speakers made it clear that we are not giving up the struggle.
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I want everybody here to think about the police. Think about how you felt at S11 during the baton charge, if you were there, or how you felt hearing about it afterwards if you weren�t. If you went to Woomera, remember how you felt seeing the Tactical Response Group with their shin-pads and riot helmets and knowing they were meant for us. As an activist or a member of the general public, think about a time when you have ever felt fear of the police, of physical violence towards yourself. Now replace the police with the Australian army, the batons with guns, and imagine yourself as an Iranian, Iraqi or Afghani refugee who is in all likelihood a refugee because you have been threatened like this before, or tortured, or had members of your family killed. Or imagine you are a child, and you have been on a boat for who knows how long, and it�s hot, and you�re scared, and you�re hungry, and now you�re being forced off this boat at gunpoint and herded into a shack in Nauru.
This is what the Australian army has done this week. It has been deployed by the Australian Government to forcibly transfer the refugees who refused to leave the HMAS Manoora onto the island of Nauru. These refugees are the 430 remaining from the Tampa, plus 224 who were taken off the Indonesian ship the Aceng after it was intercepted in Australian waters on September 7. These refugees were using the last method available to them, that of non-cooperation, in this, the latest stage in the sad, frightening and increasingly bizarre saga of how Australia treats its refugees.
We�ve stuck them in camps in the desert, and you can�t get them much further away from the average Australian unless we stick them on rockets and blast them into outer space. We�ve let them float around indefinitely in the middle of the ocean; we�ve tried to persuade Indonesia to let us fund a detention centre over there so they can add to their infamous human rights track record and deal with them. We�ve found a poor island which is itself in danger of sinking if global warming gets any worse, knocked up a couple of shacks on a football field & said "yeah, that�ll do"- and now we�re using military force to get the refugees in there!
The ironies of the situation are overwhelming. The Nauru government didn�t want to take the refugees unless they came voluntarily. THEY sent observers onto the boat to keep an eye on OUR soldiers; well, I can�t comment on the human rights standards in Nauru but they�re obviously higher than ours.
East Timor has volunteered to take some of the refugees- WE wanted to send refugees TO East Timor!- the Australian Government turned their offer down- at least we�ve got some sense of irony... And the greatest irony of all is the dual use of the Australian military - on the one hand being mobilised to go to, possibly already in, Afghanistan, enlisted in the US�s war against the Taliban, and over here being used against the same victims of that regime!
There is no value judgement here, that the Taliban have done wrong - if so we would be accepting the Afghani refugees as legitimate asylum seekers. The UNHCR said many of the Tampa "boat people" are from a religious minority group in Afghanistan, one of the most persecuted people in the world.
Our high moral ground of "good versus evil" means nothing at all.
And the Australian government is in such a hurry to get the refugees off the Manoora because we intend to send it to Afghanistan to join the war which will create even more refugees - and so the sorry saga goes on.
So, for reasons of expediency, and political point-scoring before an election, so that John Howard can say and I quote, �if that�s what had to be done, it had to be done�, we are using what amounts to psychological terrorism against a people already traumatised enough.
Regardless of what your stance is on Australia�s responsibility to refugees, any decent Australian would believe that the way we are going about this is wrong. Whoever these people are,
We are here today to call on this government to respond to this situation with a little bit of compassion and grace instead of acting like hard-hearted, mean-spirited thugs. THANKYOU.
Rivkah Nissim
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