Australian PM says government won’t bow to “moral blackmail” by asylum seekers

Thursday, 10 July 2014 00:46 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Canberra (Reuters): Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott on Wednesday (9) vowed not to bow to “moral blackmail” following reports of suicide bids by female asylum seekers at a detention centre on Christmas Island. Fairfax media reported the women had tried to kill themselves after deciding their children would have a better chance of making it to Australia without them.

Abbott said he had not seen the reports but called them “harrowing”, and added that the Government would not back down from its tough asylum policy. “No Australian Government should be subjected to the spectacle of people saying ‘unless you accept us I am going to commit self-harm’ and I don’t believe any Australian, any thinking Australian, would want us to capitulate to moral blackmail,” Abbott told the Channel 9 television network. Opposition Greens lawmaker Sarah Hanson-Young, whose party is one of the strongest critics of the Government’s ‘Operation Sovereign Borders’ immigration policy, said she had spoken to people inside the centre who reported that almost 10 mothers were on suicide watch this week. “Mothers contemplating harming themselves, sacrificing their own lives in desperation of giving their children a future,” Hanson-Young said. The Government said there had been a small number of “minor self-harm incidents” at the facility on Australia’s Indian Ocean territory of Christmas Island but declined to provide any further detail, citing the detainees’ rights to privacy. Australia’s asylum seeker policies face growing international scrutiny. A group of 153 Sri Lankan asylum seekers remain stranded in legal limbo on the high seas as Australia’s High Court considers the legality of the interception of their boat. “We’re not going to allow people to be held in a floating prison camp. The Government must make up its mind at some point what they are going to do with these individuals and they must do it in accordance with law,” said refugee lawyer George Newhouse. Another 41 asylum seekers picked up from a separate boat were handed over by Australia to Sri Lanka in a secret operation over the weekend. The Government has consistently said its operations do not breach international law, despite concern expressed by the United Nations refugee agency.