People smugglers have begun promoting trips to Australia to asylum seekers for $30,000
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Just three weeks after the Royal Australian Navy issued an extraordinary warning to people smugglers, word has spread in towns around Java in Indonesia that fishing boats were readying to carry refugees to Australia.
News Corp spoke to several desperate asylum seekers — many of whom have been languishing for a decade awaiting resettlement — in picturesque Puncak.
Prospective passenger Gholam Abbas said he was so sick of “living in limbo” he was willing to risk “death on the ocean”.“Is not fair for us, when we heard that the Australian government gave 7000 visas for Ukraine refugees in the last two months, it is not fair for us,” the 44-year-old, who has spent 10 years in a refugee camp, said.
“As refugees, we can’t have a job, we can’t open a bank account and we cannot register for a local SIM card.“No chance for making a living is the same as death so there is no different, if we are dead on the limbo or dead on the ocean.”
The issue of boat turnbacks and offshore settlements dominated the first half of the election campaign with Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese forced to clarify his position on boat turnbacks.
Opposition immigration spokeswoman Kristina Keneally also had to deny she told a group of refugee activists that she would “welcome an approach … to end offshore processing” if Labor was elected after May 21.Royal Australian Navy Rear Admiral Justin Jones, commander of Maritime and Border Command and Operation Sovereign Borders, released an astonishing 32-second video in multiple languages on April 29 warning Australia’s policies on border protection had not changed.
Another refugee News Corp spoke to said chatter had already begun on how much an illegal voyage would cost to Australia.
“No one offering me for travelling by boat yet but I have heard from a friend of mine to go to Australia now, cost starting 10,000 American dollars (A$14,444) until 20,000 American dollars (A$28,888),” Iranian-born Mohammad Amin, 26, said.“The most important thing for me right now is to find a new country that allows me to find a job, a place to sleep well, I have to manage my future, my dream.”Ali Riad, 20, from Iraq arrived in Indonesia in 2010.
“We were caught by Indonesian authorities in 2013 when me and my parents were trying to catch a boat to go to Australia somewhere in Surabaya and just before we were heading to the beach, more than 200 people were arrested and me and my parents ended up in a detention centre in Medan for four months,” he said.
He knows he doesn’t have money and doesn’t want to chance the boats again like in 2013 when then the rate he said was just over $10,000 for the three of them.“I’m sure, very sure, 100 per cent if the boat opens, many refugees will take the risk,” he said.People here follow the news, mostly looking for resettlement options.
When former US President Donald Trump came to power many lost firm placements for resettlement when that policy was curtailed. So now they wait again, listening to gossip for the next break for legal resettlement.In the past two years, 15 refugees committed suicide out of hopelessness. Many believe the figure to be twice that.
As at November 2021, there were about 13,100 refugees registered with the UNHCR office in Indonesia, with most from Afghanistan, Somalia and Myanmar. Last month many protested outside the UNHCR offices in Jakarta demanding resettlement.
Hazara Bibi Rahima says she just wants to live and work.“Many of us have skill and good profile and we are polite, so please allow us to have work in legal so we can continue our life or future,” the 32-year-old, who spends her time as a volunteer translator and nursing for refugees.Got
