Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) Australia and Jesuit Social Services have joined other Catholic organisations in expressing grave concern for the humanitarian crisis on Manus Island and calling for the Australian Government to resettle in Australia the refugees and asylum seekers detained on the island.
The Australian Government officially closed its detention centre on Manus Island on October 31. Electricity, food, water and other essential services have since been cut off. The detainees, all men who were brought to the island located in Papua New Guinea in 2013 to 2014, were supposed to relocate to alternative accommodation in Lorengau, a nearby city, but many of them have refused out of fear of being attacked by locals, choosing to remain in the camp despite being devoid of food and clean water. The UNCHR, the United Nations Refugee Agency, has also condemned the alternative accommodation in Lorengau as unsuitable and unfinished.
“They have suffered from the most appalling treatment for more than four years. They are at breaking point. And for no fault of their own except, it seems, that they are seeking Australia’s protection,” said JRS Australia Director Carolina Gottardo.
In a joint Catholic statement released on November 6, JRS Australia and Jesuit Social Services together with Catholic Alliance for People Seeking Asylum and Catholic Social Services Australia decried the desperate circumstances of the men on the island.
“A week after the official closure of the Manus Island detention centre, more than 600 refugees and people seeking asylum languish inside, unsafe and uncertain about their futures,” the statement said. “Our government has failed to provide these men with any safe alternatives.”
The statement underscored the detainees’ “right to food, water and shelter; to freedom and liberty; to be free from inhumane and degrading treatment; and to seek and receive protection”, adding that the “Australian Government is legally and morally responsible for the lives of these men who have been arbitrarily and indefinitely held in limbo for more than four years”.
The said Catholic organisations declared that “the only humane resolution to the current impasse is for the Australian Government to bring every refugee and person seeking asylum on Manus Island to Australia where they can be permanently resettled or have their claims processed in safety and with dignity”.
They also urged all Australians to take action by contacting their local federal Members of Parliament to demand an immediate change to the country’s offshore processing policy. “We Australians have a humanitarian crisis on our doorstep in Manus Island. It’s our fault and we should do something about it right now.”
To read the full statement, click here.
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