Morrison fumes, Cambodia asylum seeker deal stalls
ia’s plan to send refugees to Cambodia might not come to fruition, as the Cambodian government is dragging its feet.
After his self-congratulatory address to the National Press
Club in Canberra on Wednesday, Immigration Minister Scott Morrison
finally admitted what has been relatively common knowledge in Cambodian
and regional diplomatic circles, and the NGO community for some time:
that finalising the Australian government’s deal to resettle refugees in
Cambodia has become “frustrating”.
No kidding. Morrison’s office confirmed yesterday that
discussions were ongoing, but the Cambodian government had been pushing
back on the deal. Now the regional office of the United Nations High
Commissioner for Refugees has joined other refugee and rights groups
publicly slamming a deal in which it wants no part.
“We are deeply concerned about the precedent being set by
this type of arrangement that in the first instance, transfers asylum
seekers who have sought Australia’s protection to Nauru, in conditions
that have previously been described as harmful, then re-locates refugees
recognised in Nauru to Cambodia,” UNHCR regional spokesperson Vivian
Tan said from Bangkok, in response to questions from Crikey.
“Asylum seekers should ordinarily be processed and benefit
from protection in the territory of the state where they arrive, or
which otherwise has jurisdiction over them.”
Tan says that in a time of massive displacement in places
like Iraq, Syria and South Sudan, the “global refugee system is
undermined when states deny access to territory for certain categories
of asylum seekers and refugees, including those who arrived by boat”.
She ads that the UNHCR is concerned by any practice that
goes against “the spirit of international protection of refugees by
relocating refugees to another country where they may not be able to
access fundamental rights”, or that may allow a state that has signed
onto the Refugee Convention — e.g. Australia — to divest itself of its
responsibility under the Refugee Convention.
But even as Australia thumbs its nose at the Refugee
Convention and tries to snuggle up to the despotic regime in Cambodia,
it’s now unclear whether the deal will ever happen — although each week
gossip circulates that Morrison is about to fly to Phnom Penh for the
second time this year to ink the deal. So who knows?
The UNHCR and concern from other refugee agencies such as the Jesuit Refugee Service
aside — and the Abbott government appears to not give one hoot about
their opinion — the main fly in the ointment so far has proven to be the
Cambodian government. The government initially appeared so eager to do a
refugee-for-money swap with Australia (the figure that has been bandied
about is $40 million) that its minister announced the deal in front of a
visibly stunned Julie Bishop during her visit to begin talks on the
deal in February. But now it seems the deal has stalled.
“Cambodia
is the second-poorest country in south-east Asia after Myanmar; it is
riddled with corruption … the country has a shocking track record with
refugees…”
Son Chhay, a member of Cambodian Parliament in the
opposition Cambodian National Rescue Party, and who was once a refugee
in Australia, says the Cambodian government seems to have soured on the
deal. Chhay, who graduated from Adelaide’s Flinders University, was
quoted in The Cambodian Daily:
“I always wondered from the beginning why the [Cambodian]
government was interested in taking refugees. But the government is
reluctant now to make any agreement. It’s quite clear the government has
no interest.”
Chhay also suggested that the government was holding out for
a better deal — and it’s rumoured that it wants to start the program
with a much smaller number of refugees than Australia wants to
send. “Maybe it’s too little money,” he said. “Perhaps the deal is not
benefiting the officials involved.”
Morrison should take heed, because that is exactly how
Cambodia works. Cambodia is the second-poorest country in south-east
Asia after Myanmar; it is riddled with corruption. Audits conducted by
NGOs have proven that money meant for aid is siphoned off by officials,
though Morrison denies this. The country has a shocking track record
with refugees, returning at least 20 Chinese ethnic Muslim Uighurs to
certain imprisonment and perhaps death in 2009.
Cambodia relies on foreign aid for about half its budget, so
it will be desperate for extra millions to make up for any shortfall
after Australia slashed its foreign aid program. However, it seems even
the authoritarian Hun Sen regime may have its limits, even though
Australia has provided Cambodia with $329 million in aid over the past
four years.
The UNHCR said it is trying to help improve things in the
country’s limited refugee infrastructure — Cambodia is currently
processing 12 asylum seekers and has 68 refugees, and it has insisted
that any people coming from Nauru do so voluntarily. Yet the question of
what measures Australia is taking to educate them about such a
momentous decision is likely to remain unanswered.
Last month Morrison sent senior Immigration Department
bureaucrat Greg Kelly — whose most recent expertise has been in refugee
detention, aid workers said — to head a 10-person visit to Phnom Penh to
try to get the deal over the line. So far he has been scouting for
locations for the detention centre far from the Cambodian capital, where
there are few schools, hospitals or other essential services, according
to The Phnom Penh Post.
Now it seems that the UNHCR, in addressing its concerns to
both governments in writing and in meetings, has rebuffed efforts to get
the organisation to give its imprimatur to a deal that no one much
likes.
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