Australia’s Controversial Refugee Deal with Cambodia in Doubt

Part of the Manus Island regional processing facility to accommodate the refugees Australia’s ill-reputed refugee deal with Cambodia is in jeopardy. Months after former Immigration Minister Scott Morrison signed an agreement for asylum seekers to be settled in Cambodia after offshore processing on Nauru and Manus Island, progress on the arrangement is yet to be seen.

The Australian government first began processing Australia-bound ‘boat people’ offshore on Nauru in the early 2000s. Out of over 800 detainees currently held on the Pacific island, only three agreed to meet with Cambodian officials to discuss permanent transfer to the impoverished Southeast Asian nation. Of these three, it is yet unsure if any will ultimately decide to resettle there. Despite these recent discouraging developments and continued widespread condemnation of the deal, Australia appears to remain committed to the plan. The Australian government has pledged to fund the Cambodian delegation for another trip to Nauru, and new immigration minister Peter Dutton will soon be flying to Cambodia to engage in further discussions.

‘Boat people’—the popularised term for asylum seekers travelling to Australia, often on makeshift water vessels—first began arriving on the shores of the world’s largest island in the 1970’s as a result of the refugee outflow from the Vietnam War. At that time, the phenomenon fuelled the final breakdown of the White Australia Policy, causing the initial metamorphosis of the Australian population from an exclusively European cohort (other than the small amount of remaining Aboriginals who were not counted as citizens until 1967) into a truly diverse community.

As a result of the colossal change this initial influx of non-white refugees catalysed, it was met with a mixture of sympathy and unsureness by the Australian community. However, the public’s attitude has become increasingly suspicious and adverse; in the late 1970’s only 20% of Australians wanted to send refugees home indiscriminately, while in 1993 44% supported this policy. In the most recent federal election in 2013, the issue of boat people was more prominent than ever. Although the Australian Labour Party (ALP) had fostered a more sympathetic attitude towards refugees in previous years, , in the 2013 election, the ALP, under Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, adopted an even more hard-line policy direction than their Liberal opponents, due to the strong anti-boat sentiment among the the Australian populations.

The Rudd administration moved beyond supporting offshore processing—known as the ‘Pacific Solution’—and promised that no refugee travelling to Australia by boat would ever be granted settlement in the country. Rudd lost the election, but the detainees in the Pacific did not fare any better under Tony Abbott’s leadership. Currently, those detainees on Manus Island are undertaking a well-publicised hunger strike.

The Cambodian solution was put in place in order to create an alternative permanent home to those processed in the Pacific and found to be genuine refugees. In light of the decision to keep even genuine asylum seekers from finding a home in Australia, a replacement location had to be found. The Australian government promised Cambodia an extra $40 million to cover resettlement costs and help support the refugees in terms of healthcare, job training and daily subsistence. From the outset, this resolution was explicitly condemned by UNHCR, representative Vivian Tan asserting “we do not have a role in this bilateral agreement,’’ and the organization characterising Australia’s policy venture as creating a dangerous precedent.

As one of the world’s most corrupt and poorest nations, Cambodia does not appear to be a legitimate replacement for displaced persons seeking safety and opportunity in Australia, one of the world’s wealthiest, least corrupt and most sparsely populated nations. An extra $40 million or not, it seems unlikely that refugees would be able to build a better life for themselves in Cambodia than in the war torn horrors of nation states they are fleeing. Considering this, the lack of enthusiasm for permanent transplantation to Cambodia among refugees is unsurprising, and continued efforts to push the program by Australia and Cambodia could be futile. Given the administrative costs of establishing the resettlement program, and the fact that the $40 million dollar pledge is not contingent on refugees actually choosing to settle in Cambodia— the Australian government may well turn out to be throwing money down the drain. Coupled with the widespread international disputation of Australia’s handling of their refugee problem, coming from places as high up as the U.N., it looks as though the deal may hurt its engineers just as much as the hundreds of persons it is currently holding hostage, floating halfway in the Pacific.