Governments that issue press releases about the abuse of human rights tend to avoid close gazes at the mirror.\u00a0 Doing so would be telling.\u00a0 In the case of Australia, its record on dealing with refugees is both abysmal and cruel.\u00a0 It tends to be easier to point the finger at national security laws in Hong Kong and concentration camps in Xinjiang.\u00a0 Wickedness is always easily found afar.<\/p>\n
Australia\u2019s own concentration camp system hums along, inflicting suffering upon asylum seekers and refugees who fled suffering by keeping them in a state of calculated limbo.\u00a0 Its brutality has been so normalised, it barely warrants mention in Australia\u2019s sterile news outlets.\u00a0 In penitence, the country\u2019s literary establishment pays homage to the victims, such as the Kurdish Iranian writer Behrouz Boochani.\u00a0 Garlands and literary prizes have done nothing to shift the vicious centre in Canberra.\u00a0 Boat arrivals remain political slurry and are treated accordingly.<\/p>\n
Recently, there were small signs that prevalent amnesia and indifference were being disturbed.\u00a0 The fate of some 200 refugees and asylum seekers brought to the Australian mainland for emergency medical treatment piqued the interest of certain activists.\u00a0 Prior to its repeal<\/a> as part of a secret arrangement between the Morrison government and Tasmanian senator Jacqui Lambie in December last year, the medical evacuation law was a mixed blessing.<\/p>\n While it was championed as a humanitarian instrument, it did not ensure one iota of freedom.\u00a0 As before, limbo followed like a dank smell.\u00a0 The repeal of the legislation offered another prospect of purgatory, only this time on the mainland.<\/p>\n The individuals in question have found themselves detained in Melbourne at the Mantra Bell City Hotel in Preston, and the Kangaroo Point Central Hotel in Brisbane.\u00a0\u00a0 In the mind of Refugee Action Coalition spokesman Ian Rintoul, the conditions at both abodes are more restrictive<\/a> than those on Nauru.\u00a0 The medical help promised has also been tardily delivered, if at all.<\/p>\n \u201cMy life is exactly the size of a room, and a narrow corridor,\u201d reflects<\/a> Mostafa (Moz) Azimitabar, who has been detained at the Mantra for 13 months.\u00a0 Like his fellow detainees, he has become a spectacle, able to see protesters gather outside the hotel, the signs pleading for their release, drivers honking in solidarity.\u00a0 He sees himself as \u201ca fish inside an aquarium \u2026 The whole of my life in this window to see the real life, where people are driving, walking; when they wave to us.\u00a0 And when I wave back at them.\u00a0 This is my life.\u201d<\/p>\n When former Australian soccer player turned human rights activist Craig Foster visited Azimitabar, conversation could only take place between a transparent plastic barrier.\u00a0 \u201cI had to talk with him behind the glass,\u201d tweeted<\/a> the detainee.\u00a0 \u201cSeveral times a day Serco officers enter my room and there aren\u2019t any glasses for them.\u201d<\/p>\n After the visit, Foster described<\/a> the corrosion of liberties, \u201cthis constant theme of the most onerous regulations \u2026 constantly chipping away – just taking another right, another right, another right, and making them feel less and less and less human, if that\u2019s possible after eight years.\u201d<\/p>\n The more obstreperous refugees have been targeted by the Department of Home Affairs and forcibly relocated.\u00a0 Iranian refugee Farhad Rahmati found himself shifted<\/a> from Kangaroo Point to the Brisbane Immigration Transit Accommodation Centre (BITA), and then to Villawood.\u00a0 BITA also received four more from Kangaroo Point in mid-November.<\/p>\n The advent of COVID-19 compounded the situation.\u00a0 Detainees already vulnerable to other medical conditions faced another danger.\u00a0 The authorities gave a big shrug.\u00a0 Shared bathrooms are the norm and are infrequently cleaned.\u00a0 Hand sanitizer containers are left empty or broken<\/a>.\u00a0 The inquiry into the failure of Victoria\u2019s quarantine system that led to a second infectious wave in Melbourne avoided considering the conditions of detained refugees.\u00a0 Writing in Eureka Street<\/em>, Andra Jackson wondered<\/a> if this had anything to do with the fact \u201cthat these men, now detained in some instances for six to seven years, have behaved more responsibly that [sic] some returning travellers.\u201d<\/p>\n The government authorities did release five refugees from the medevac hotels last week, threatened by lawsuits testing the legal status of their detention.\u00a0 On December 14, the 60 men detained at the Mantra were told that they would be moving to another undisclosed location.\u00a0 The conclusion of the contract with the hotel has the Department of Home Affairs considering its options, and all are bound to aggravate the distress of the detainees.<\/p>\n Alison Battinson of Human Rights for All has a suggestion<\/a> bound to be ignored.\u00a0 \u201cInstead of telling the gentlemen that they are going to be moved to another place of detention – that hasn\u2019t been disclosed to them – the more sensible approach would be to release them as per the law.\u201d<\/p>\n The only ray of compassion in this mess of inhumanity has come in the form of a Canadian resettlement scheme.\u00a0 Nine refugees have already availed themselves of the opportunity; another twenty await their fate.\u00a0 Australian politicians, as they so often do on this subject, are nowhere to be found.<\/p>\n The post Abuse on the Mainland: Australia\u2019s Medevac Hotel Detentions<\/a> first appeared on Dissident Voice<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n