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Jesus was born into a family of internal refugees. His mother had to seek refuge, fleeing Herod's nasty dictatorship. It's uncertain whether she used the services of satanic people smugglers.
It is curious and sad that in weeks when our media are celebrating WikiLeaks and Julian Assange, we can accept so easily a government-managed story, whose public accountability obligation stares us in the face. Perhaps because editors know that our complacent society really does not want to go there.
May I tell you about one refugee whom I met during the 20 years I lived and worked JRS? The story has no happy outcome, indeed far from it. But it may help to communicate some of the feelings that inspire many who accompany the refugees.
Jesuit Refugee Service Australia says Labor's new policy on asylum seekers should be focused on the protection of vulnerable people rather than the elimination of people smugglers.
As the election lather on the asylum seeker issue continues, let's ask, 'Why is it right to treat the honest, unvisaed boat person more harshly than the visaed airplane passenger who fails to declare their intention to apply for asylum?'
The Coalition's new asylum seeker policy returns to the policy it put into practice under Mr Howard, adding new nasties. The Government's asylum seeker policy is bad; the Coalition's is worse. It is designed to appeal to human baseness, not to human generosity.
For a while we were leading the world on climate change. But once Copenhagen collapsed Rudd assured us 'Australia will do no more and no less than the rest of the world'. The lowest common denominator is not usually the solution to the great moral challenges.
Significant agreement was achieved in Copenhagen on the present and future forcible displacement of people because of climate change and environmental degradation. Can global cooperation for the protection of vulnerable displaced persons be renewed to meet new circumstances?
Shaun Carney from The Age remarks that governments can be expected to treat refugee policy as 'just politics'. We have seen the consequences for the economy of tolerating 'business as usual'. It would be a pity to prostitute government in the same way.
Peter Costello draws a long bow in presuming smugglers provided the boat that sank off the Cocos Islands this week. As with the sinking of the SIEV X, it is unfortunate that it takes a tragedy to remind us that at the heart of this issue are desperate human beings.
The reception of asylum seekers is to be judged by the human reality of those who seek asylum, not by convenience of those on whom they make a claim. It is morally unjustifiable for Australia to transfer its responsibilities to Indonesia.
109-120 out of 143 results.