SYDNEY: Refugees barricaded inside a shuttered Australian detention camp in Papua New Guinea were becoming “distraught and depressed”, detainees said on Friday, as New Zealand renewed an offer to resettle some of them.
The remote camp on PNG’s Manus Island — one of two centres holding asylum-seekers who tried to reach Australia by boat — was proclaimed closed on Tuesday after the nation’s Supreme Court ruled it was unconstitutional.
Australia shut off water and electricity to the camp, but some 600 men remain inside, fearful for their safety if they move to transition centres where locals are reportedly hostile. “The current mood of the men is they are really distraught and depressed,” Manus detainee and Sudanese refugee Abdul Aziz Adam said.
“We are just helping and caring for each other and trying to help each other just to stay alive,” the 24-year-old said.
As the stand-off entered its fourth day, New Zealand’s new Labour government renewed an offer to take 150 of the refugees which was initially made in 2013 but never acted upon by Australia. “We would like to work with Australia to help find a compassionate solution to this,” Immigration Minister Iain Lees-Galloway told Radio New Zealand.
“We’ve got an offer of 150 people and we really hope that Australia takes that up... we are here to help,” he said.
The issue is set to arise when New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, who came to power just last month, meets Australia’s conservative Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull in Sydney on Sunday.
Iranian Behrouz Boochani, another Manus detainee, said on Friday the detainees viewed New Zealand as a “big opportunity to take us from this hellhole prison”.
“We are asking the New Zealand PM to make a serious negotiation with the Australian government and if Australia rejects it again, to try to do a deal with PNG.” — AFP
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