The Regional Resettlement Arrangement between
Australia and Papua New Guinea, colloquially known as the PNG solution, is the name given to an Australian government
policy in which any asylum seeker who
comes to Australia by boat without a visa will be refused
settlement in Australia, instead being settled in Papua New Guinea if they are found to be
legitimate refugees. The policy includes a significant expansion of the Australian
immigration detention facility on Manus Island, where refugees will be sent to be
processed prior to resettlement in Papua New Guinea, and if their refugee
status is found to be non-genuine, they will be either repatriated, sent to a
third country other than Australia or remain in detention indefinitely. The
policy was announced on 19 July 2013 by Australian Prime
Minister Kevin Rudd and Papua New
Guinean Prime Minister Peter O'Neill, effective immediately, in response
to a growing number of asylum seeker boat arrivals and subsequent deaths at
sea. The then Opposition
Leader Tony Abbott initially
welcomed the policy, while Greens leader Christine Milne and several human rights advocate groups opposed it, with
demonstrations protesting the policy held in every major Australian city after
the announcement.
The topic of
asylum seekers arriving in Australia by boat, or irregular maritime arrivals
(IMAs) has been a highly contentious issue in Australian politics since the government of John Howard. The Pacific Solution policy was first implemented in
2001 following a rising number of IMAs culminating in the Tampa affair and the Children Overboard
affair,[1] introduced the practice of intercepting
asylum seeker boats and transferring the occupants to the Nauru detention centre
for processing, as well as Manus Island in Papua New Guinea. This was
successful in slowing the number of asylum seeker arrivals by boat—from 5516
arrivals in 2001 to 1 arrival in 2002[2]—but the conditions of the offshore
processing centres, the lack of independent scrutiny, and the mental health
impact on the occupants, attracted significant criticism and controversy.[1]
Upon Kevin
Rudd's 2007 election
win, the Pacific Solution was abandoned, with the Nauru processing centre
closed down in February 2008,[3] a move welcomed by the UN Refugee Agency.[4] Since 2008, the number of asylum seeker
arrivals by boat increased substantially—from 148 in 2007 to 6555 in 2010.[2] This contributed to Rudd's ailing
popularity through to 2010, when he resigned prior to a leadership
spill of the Australian Labor Party
to Julia Gillard; at this time Rudd said "This
party and government will not be lurching to the right on
the question of asylum seekers".[5]
In July
2010, Gillard showed support for the utilisation of "regional processing
centres".[6] In December 2010, in the aftermath of
an asylum seeker boat sinking
at Christmas Island
in which 48 occupants perished, Queensland Premier and
ALP national president Anna Bligh called for a
complete review of the government's policy on asylum seekers.[7] In May 2011, the Gillard government put
forward a plan to swap new asylum seekers for already-processed refugees in
Malaysia. The policy, dubbed the Malaysian solution, was declared unlawful by
the Australian High Court.[8]
In 2012, the
government commissioned the Houston Report to provide advice on the issue of
IMAs. It handed down 22 recommendations, including the immediate reopening of
immigration detention facilities on Manus Island and Nauru,[9] which the government implemented with
bipartisan support.[10] Amnesty International
described the conditions of the Nauru detention facility as
"appalling" at this time.[11] In June 2013, Kevin Rudd toppled
Gillard in another leadership spill, following weeks of polls
indicating the ALP would be defeated at the next election.[12]
The number
of IMAs continued to climb, to 25,173 in the 2012-13 financial year,[2] and approximately 862 asylum seekers
died trying to reach Australia between 2008 and July 2013.[13] (Cartoon from Pickering Post)
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