In March last year Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono told the Australian Parliament that laws to criminalize people smuggling were being given top priority in the Republic.
But the laws were not passed till May this year and it's clear they are not being policed. Australian journalists based in Jakarta have written of seeing notorious people smugglers doing business in the capital under the noses of the police.
The issue is huge in Australia though of less importance in Indonesia, which hasn't signed the UN convention on refugees. But authorities still have to uphold local laws
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In Australia Prime Minister Julia Gillard and Opposition Leader Tony Abbott have spent the past year squabbling over solutions to the problem, each accusing the other on being soft on border protection.
Canberra tried to do a deal with Kuala Lumpur for asylum seekers to be processed in Malaysia. The plan foundered when refugee advocates successfully appealed to the Australian High Court.
The Liberal opposition wants a return to processing on the Micronesian island of Nauru. This was the so called Pacific Solution used when John Howard was PM, but scrapped when Labor took office in 2007.
The impasse has encouraged people smugglers to boost their nefarious trade; Australian immigration is now forecasting 600 arrivals a month. Though small by international standards the facts aren't damming fears of a flood.
Despite the terrible loss it's unlikely the risks will deter. In 2001 SIEV X sank killing 353. The Great South Land's democracy, fairness, welfare systems, free health and education, high wages and legal aid are powerful magnets to the persecuted and those seeking better futures.
Although there's great public anger in Australia towards the boat people – including from penniless refugees who waited years in overseas camps for invitations to resettle – there's also significant support. A report by the respected think tank Centre for Policy Development said Australia's refugee and asylum policies were "inhumane, ineffective and expensive."
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Australia, a nation built by migrants, has an annual quota of 13,750 refugees. The uninvited, dubbed 'queue jumpers' and 'illegal immigrants' by opponents, pay traffickers up to $US 5,000 for one-way tickets.
Australia has harsh laws against people smugglers, but these seldom snare the czars. Instead the cowards get poor Indonesian fishermen to do the dirty work, favoring teenagers who are sent home if under 17.
George Newhouse is an Australian lawyer acting for survivors of the SIEV 221 disaster. He's been quoted saying 1000 people had drowned while politicians used asylum seekers as political footballs.
''This disgraceful state of affairs is the result of both political parties being unable to come to a bipartisan agreement and to develop an offshore processing policy to deal with asylum seekers,'' he told The Age newspaper.
''If our leaders had an ounce of decency - both of them - they would get together and formulate a serious policy to deal with the issue.''
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