Femantle: Jan 31 forum about West Papuan asylum seekers and their reasons for the trip : Melbourne Indymedia

with

- Senator Kerry Nettle, Greens spokesperson for refugees
- Mandurah-based Christmas Island refugee advocate Kaye Bernard
- Project SafeCom's Jack H Smit who was born in The Netherlands, and
- Australian West Papua Association supporter Ned Byrne

31 January 2006, 7:00pm to 9:30pm
@ Kulcha Multicultural Arts of WA, South Terrace (above DOME), Fremantle WA
(entry by donation)

Even while the International Commission of Jurists as well as many other groups and organizations around Australia stated that they are genuine asylum seekers, that they came to the country nearest to them in accordance with the UN Refugee Convention and that they did not come using people smugglers, and therefore that they should live on Bridging Visas in the community and treated as our neighbours like the East Timorese, the Australian government locked them up - and away - in the Christmas Island detention centre and in houses on the island.
DIMIA also announced they had started an investigation into involvement of "people smugglers" and on the same day they burnt the traditional boat, a canoe with outriggers - the "incriminating item" itself that could "implicate" the so-called people smugglers...

Has anything changed since Tampa?

Has DIMIA learnt its lessons from the Cornelia Rau and Vivian Alvarez scandals?

Does the government treat refugees with the respect they deserve?

The canoe that made it all the way from Merauke to Weipa - What is the problem in West Papua? - Why is the Indonesian government calling any refugee claims by these men, women and seven children "baseless"? - What happened in West Papua since the Dutch in 1962 relinquished control to the Sukarno government of their colony? - What was the "Act of Free Choice" and will West Papua ever become independent like East Timor? - Why did the Cairns Chamber of Commerce issue a press release urging the government to treat these asylum seekers in a "hard-lined" way?

Come and find out the issues behind this extraordinary journey of 43 men, women and children, from Senator Kerry Nettle who flies back from Christmas Island on this very day, from Kaye Bernard who has some experience with DIMIA when she lobbied for the Vietnamese refugees, and who was on Christmas Island; from refugee advocate, lobbyist and activist Jack H Smit, who remembers the days of the Dutch hand-over of West Papua, and from Ned Byrne, who travelled in West Papua and who met some of the people and families in 2002 when he was there.

More information:

The office of Greens Senator Rachel Siewert [Nicola Paris, phone (08) 9228-3277]
or
Project SafeCom [Jack 0417 090 130]