World Refugee Day - 20 June

Villawood Immigration Detention Cente, in suburban Sydney.

Today is the United Nations World Refugee Day. Not that you would know from the media in Australia where it isn't mentioned.

Originally a migrant hostel in the 1960s and 70s, now a detention centre for people who over-stay their visas, and people who have had their applications for refugee status turned down, and who are awaiting appeals to be heard, or deportation.

Unlike other Western-style democracies, Australia has a policy of locking up all applicants for political asylum who have arrived in Australian territory without documentation. Some remain in custody for years while the government decides their fate.

Those locked up include children, and doctors worry that the long-term confinement of children in facilities where they frequently witness violence and are denied adequate schooling is causing serious psychological harm. Some children, they fear, will never recover. Several children have attempted suicide. Others have gone on hunger strikes. At least three teenage boys have sewn their lips shut to protest their incarceration and treatment, according to detainees.

Due to vigorous protest, some women and children who make it to the Australian mainland to seek asylum are allowed to be housed outside detention centres whils awaiting their fate. Others, who only get as far as territories offshore are not so lucky. The Australian government cut many such places out of what they deem to be the "Immigration Zone" and lock up the asylum seekers offshore, on Manus Island, Christmas Island or Nauru.

Mandatory detention was introduced in 1992 under the previous, labor, government. It has continued, and hardened under the present government which has been in power since 1996. Australia does take in about 12 000 refugees a year; the government prefers that they make their way first to another country where they apply for asylum, and are then processed in those countries, rather than arriving in Australia and claiming asylum. The government prefers an "orderly queue", which for desperate people in desperate circumstances, in places where there is no Australian mission is not always possible.

The vast majority of people who do make their way to Australia territory are ultimately assessed to have genuine claims for asylum and are admited as refugees.

For more information, an organisation specifically concerned with getting children out of detention is Chilout.

Other organisations include A Just Australia - Australians for Just Refugee Programs and Australians Against Racism.

Refugee:

International law defines a "refugee" as a person who has fled from and/or cannot return to their country due to a well-founded fear of persecution, including war or civil conflict.
A refugee is a person who "owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality, and is unable to or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country…"
Article 1, The 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees

Asylum Seeker:
An asylum seeker is a person who has left their country of origin, has applied for recognition as a refugee in another country, and is awaiting a decision on their application.