Asylum Policy – President-elect faces test over deal to take Australia refugees

The outgoing US administration has handed president-elect Donald Trump an early test of his resolve to crack down on Muslim immigration. It comes in the form of an agreement to resettle some of the refugees Australia holds on remote Pacific islands.

John Kerry, US secretary of state, said yesterday that Washington had agreed to consider resettlement referrals from the UN High Commissioner for Refugees for some of the 1,500 refugees living in offshore processing camps on Nauru and Papua New Guinea.

“We know that these refugees are of special interest to UNHCR and we are very engaged with them on a humanitarian basis there and in other parts of the world,” he said in New Zealand.

Under the bilateral deal, which could be unpicked by the Trump administration, some of the most vulnerable refugees on Nauru would be offered resettlement in the US. Many are Muslims from Iran, Syria, Iraq and Myanmar, according to refugee advocates.

On the US campaign trail, Mr Trump proposed a ban on Muslim immigration into the US to protect the country from terrorist attacks. Mr Kerry said he was unable to answer whether the president-elect would seek to overturn the deal with Australia, which is likely to take months to implement.

Malcolm Turnbull, Australia’s prime minister, said the resettlement deal was a “one-off agreement” and would not be repeated for any asylum seekers who attempted to make the journey to Australia by boat in the future. He could not provide any specifics on the number of refugees likely to be resettled in the US, saying US officials would arrive in the next few days to begin the process.

Peter Dutton, Australia’s immigration minister, said the reprocessing centre on Nauru would remain open indefinitely after the deal and he warned that any refugees who refused resettlement in the US would stay in the camp. He added that Canberra was negotiating a new 20-year visa with Nauru for refugees left on the island.

Under its hardline asylum policy, Australia directs its navy to turn back any boats carrying asylum seekers into international waters. And it puts those who arrive by boat in detention camps on South Pacific islands, while refusing to host those granted refugee status.

The policy has left almost 2,000 refugees and asylum seekers languishing in harsh conditions in camps with little hope of resettlement until now. But it has been ruthlessly effective in cutting the numbers of asylum seekers arriving by boat; in fact, Canberra has reported no arrivals since the policy was introduced in late 2013.

Over the past year Australia has faced growing international condemnation of its offshore processing regime and for failing to resettle refugees. The UN has warned that Australia’s policies violate the convention against torture, and Amnesty International recently said Canberra was deliberately subjecting refugees to “an elaborate and cruel system of abuse” to deter them from seeking asylum.

Australia’s opposition Labor party welcomed the prospect of a resettlement deal with the US. But human rights advocates criticised the lack of detail on the resettlement offer; they also questioned whether it would be implemented given Mr Trump’s opposition to Muslim immigration during the US presidential election campaign.

“This announcement is full of holes,” said Daniel Webb, director of legal advocacy at the Human Rights Law Centre. “No timeframe. No numbers. No detail on what the government will do with the hundreds of innocent people who will be left behind. It’s not a plan.”

Ian Rintoul, spokesman for the Refugee Action Coalition, said implementing the resettlement deal could still go “pear-shaped” given past comments from Mr Trump about banning Muslim immigration to the US.