Hundreds of refugees being held at a remote Papua New Guinea detention camp will be moved by October despite uncertainty over a resettlement deal with the United States, Australia’s immigration minister said Thursday. Canberra sends asylum-seekers who try to enter the country by boat to camps on Nauru and PNG’s Manus Island, with those found … Read more
Australia has created a super ministry combining its security agencies including the domestic spy service, border force and national police, the country’s prime minister said on Tuesday, calling the “historic change” necessary to tackle terrorism. The new Home Affairs portfolio — which uses Britain’s Home Office as a template — will be run by Immigration … Read more
The abrupt departure of American officials from an Australian Pacific island refugee camp has fanned fears among asylum-seekers that plans to resettle them in the US may not go ahead, an activist group said Sunday. Canberra sends asylum-seekers who try to enter Australia by boat to camps on Nauru and Papua New Guinea’s Manus Island, … Read more
Australia Sunday gave 7,500 boatpeople until October to prove they are genuine refugees or be kicked out, declaring the “game is up” for illegal arrivals ripping off taxpayers. Before the conservatives took power and adopted a tough line on the issue in 2013, an estimated 50,000 asylum-seekers flooded into Australia on more than 800 boats … Read more
Canberra on Thursday unveiled plans to put “Australian values” at the heart of tougher requirements to gain citizenship, including competent English, belief in gender equality and a four-year qualification period. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said Australia was “an “extraordinary nation… We’re not defined by race or religion or culture, as many other nations are. “We’re … Read more
Drunk soldiers “went on a rampage” and fired shots in the air at an Australian asylum-seeker camp in Papua New Guinea, police said on Sunday, in the latest violence to rock the scandal-hit facility. PNG police announced an investigation into the unrest at the Manus Island facility, an offshore processing centre reopened in 2012 to … Read more
Asylum-seekers sent by Australia to a Papua New Guinea camp will be resettled there if they are not offered a place in the United States, Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said Sunday. Canberra sends asylum-seekers who try to enter the country to offshore processing centres in PNG’s Manus Island and Nauru, blocking them from resettling in … Read more
Australia’s prime minister has said he “read the riot act” to three ministers after they went home early, meaning his government lost a series of votes. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s conservative coalition holds a majority of one seat in the parliament. The opposition Labor Party came within a single vote of calling for a royal … Read more