Australia is to close a detention center at the heart of long-running controversy over its treatment of foreign asylum seekers, the government announced yesterday.
The Baxter detention center, north of Adelaide in South Australia state, will revert to the defense department, Immigration Minister Kevin Andrews said, although no date was specified.
Andrews said that it was possible to close Baxter because of Australia's system of processing asylum seekers offshore, particularly in its Pacific neighbor of Nauru.
"Stemming the flow of illegal arrivals has been a key part of the measures to make Australia's borders secure and assure the integrity of its immigration program," Andrews said.
Australia's use of offshore processing centers has been widely criticized at home and abroad as flouting international norms on treatment of refugees.
Some of the buildings at the Baxter center will be moved to the Northern Territory, as part of an ongoing program to reduce child abuse in indigenous communities, Andrews said.
"I am very pleased that the Baxter buildings can be put to good use in support of the government's commitment to the protection of Aboriginal children in the Northern Territory," he said.
The move is likely to be seen as politically motivated. Australian Prime Minister John Howard won the 2001 election by taking a strong stance against illegal asylum seekers, prompting international condemnation.
He is running for a fifth term later this year and is lagging in the polls to opposition leader Kevin Rudd.
Refugee advocates welcomed the closure but said it was overshadowed by the building of a new detention center on Australia's remote Indian Ocean possession of Christmas Island.
"Closing Baxter doesn't come on its own because as Baxter closes, the Christmas Island gulag opens to the tune of A$400 million [US$314 million]," said Jack Smit of Project Safecom.
"It's the most grotesque Orwellian invention and millions of dollars of taxpayers' money is getting squandered by a government which has wedged itself into a corner of human rights abuses of innocent people," he said.
Some 12 inmates were still held at Baxter as of last week, he said.
GSL Australia, the company which has managed the Baxter facility for the government for the past three years, said the closure would affect the jobs of 100 staff.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese