INTERVIEW – RADIO 2SM WITH LEON DELANEY
4 November 2009
Subjects: Oceanic Viking and asylum seeker vessel rescue
DELANEY: Federal Minister for Home Affairs, Brendan O'Connor, good morning.
O’CONNOR: Good morning.
DELANEY: How's it going today?
O’CONNOR: Well, of course it's been difficult for the foreign commercial vessels and our aircraft in recovering these passengers off a vessel that sank Sunday evening.
The latest advice is that there are 27 survivors, including one 15 year old. It's also believed that two youths were also among the missing. The body of one of the deceased people are on the LNG Pioneer, with the 27 survivors. Two others were sighted but were not recovered.
It's only just becoming - so it's just short of coming to light in that area, so the sun is just rising. The vessels will then make a decision, in conjunction with the Australian Maritime Safety Authority as to whether to call the rescue off.
DELANEY: Okay. There's concern that there's not much hope for finding any further survivors, is there?
O’CONNOR: That's right. The survivability decreases of course as the time elapses. And the decision will be made this morning, Indonesian time, because that's where of course the search is - that's where the search area is, and once that decision is made, either the search will continue for some time or the LNG Pioneer will head to Christmas Island with the 27 survivors.
DELANEY: Why Christmas Island? Because obviously there's been a great deal of discussion in the past week or two about the other asylum seekers who have been delivered to Indonesia, and they're still currently the subject of that well publicised standoff.
O’CONNOR: Yes, the vessel that was in some trouble on Sunday, and sent out a distress signal Sunday, was 2700 kilometres from the mainland of Australia but was in the Australian search and rescue zone. The decision when the Safety of Life at Sea convention is being enacted, is to bring those rescued to a safe port and to a port that's appropriate in the circumstances and subject to the master of vessel's agreement, the people are taken to the most appropriate port and in this case Christmas Island is appropriate. It is convenient; there will be people who can properly treat the survivors and, for that reason, they will head to Christmas Island.
DELANEY: Is there any information known on why the boat sank?
O’CONNOR: There's speculation but, no, at this point there's been no confirmed reason why the boat sank. On Sunday morning our time, about 7.10am the Australian Maritime Safety Authority received a distress signal, took some hours to locate the vessel. We realised then it was 2700 kilometres away from the mainland, 600 kilometres away from Cocos Island. We immediately - that is the authority immediately put out a request for vessels to respond. As we know now, the Taiwanese vessel and the Bahamas LNG Pioneer headed towards the area on the Sunday and we know of course very late Sunday evening it sank. As for the reasons, they're yet to be determined and there will be an appropriate inquiry once the rescue mission has been completed.
DELANEY: It's been suggested that these people were attempting to travel directly from Sri Lanka to Australia and avoid Indonesia specifically because of the controversy that has existed over the asylum seekers on board the Oceanic Viking and the other 255 at Merak.
Is there any substance to that suggestion?
O’CONNOR: The purpose of travel at this point, or the purpose of the voyage has yet to be confirmed. But can I say, in relation to those vessels that head to our country to seek asylum, they've been coming via Indonesia, Malaysia and been coming direct from Sri Lanka for many a year. It's not unusual to take one route or another.
In relation to this vessel we've yet to confirm the purpose of the voyage, and until we do so we cannot speculate as to why they were in the water and why they were in distress.
We also know, Leon, and I think it's important to note that of course we have - we do have people smugglers enticing people onto unseaworthy[sic] vessels. That's why we put a lot of effort into dismantling the syndicates in Indonesia and other places in the region.
I mean, these are despicable people, entice and stealing life savings - enticing people on perilous journeys. And I - and, look, whilst I can't confirm that's the case here, it's happened in the past and we really need to do everything we can to prevent it happening in the future.
DELANEY: Do you have any response to the apparent suggestion yesterday by Tony Abbott that these events are directly the responsibility of the Australian Government and its policies?
O’CONNOR: I understand Mr Abbott retracted those comments but the fact is the Liberal Party and Malcolm Turnbull are devoid of any policy on border protection. They have no policy whatsoever and they revert therefore to fear and smear. We saw it with the fake email and we see it now.
The attempt, in the Government's view, to use a maritime tragedy to score political points is sickening. At this point we are focused entirely on the rescue mission and then treating these survivors. And in the broader issues, going to border protection, we'll continue to do everything we can to dismantle organised syndicates that exploit sometimes desperate people, and we'll have an orderly and humane approach to asylum seekers.
That, I think, is the balanced and reasonable approach and the approach the Government continues to take.
DELANEY: There is some concern that the Government perhaps has been sending mixed messages. It's been suggested that the message of tough and humane is paradoxical and self-contradictory, and that the Government may be a little confused about exactly what its own policy is in dealing with these matters. And indeed the matters relating to the asylum seekers on the Oceanic Viking and the others in Indonesian waters at present are rather complex matters, aren't they?
O’CONNOR: Well, these matters are complex and challenging. The facts are that there's been a massive increase in people being displaced. The civil war in Sri Lanka has displaced 250,000 or more people in very recent times.
The Afghanistan war last year was the most violent year for seven years. These conflicts result in increased likelihood of people seeking asylum in First World countries, most of whom go to Europe and other places. But of course we've had an increase here. And the fact is we're not going to blur the line between victim and villain. We are hard and tough on people smugglers but we also want to distinguish them from those desperate people that are seeking asylum.
People smugglers will stop at nothing to entice people on vessels. It would not matter one iota whether there was any change to domestic policy. The facts are that the people smugglers will say or do anything to get people onto vessels.
We know that there are desperate people who can easily be exploited. It's for that reason we need to dismantle those syndicates and that's why we've dedicated a lot of resources in Indonesia and other countries in the region.
Indonesian Government themselves have dedicated more resources. It set up a people smuggling task force of 145 Indonesian National Police. This is to ensure we can remove that criminal element and have wherever possible an orderly process of asylum.
DELANEY: There's increasing pressure on the Government to bring the asylum seekers on the Oceanic Viking to Christmas Island as well, including pressure from within the Labor movement and union leaders and so on.
The standoff can't last forever and it is increasingly - it appears to be increasingly inhumane to keep them where they are, doesn't it?
O’CONNOR: Look, can I say firstly in relation to the conditions on the vessel, the amenities are good. Everyone is being looked after and fed. The doctor on vessel is assessing people. We have - let's remember this vessel was found in the Indonesian search and rescue zone, rescued by HMAS Armidale and then subsequently the Oceanic Viking, led by the Indonesian authorities. An agreement was reached on humanitarian grounds to - between the two countries to have the Oceanic Viking transfer those passengers onto Indonesian soil. There's now been some sticking points in terms of the passengers' issues and we are working through those. The Indonesians have said they are patient. We are too. And we want to work through this in a civil way to have the peaceful transfer of those passengers on Indonesian territory.
DELANEY: Nevertheless many of the Indonesian local authorities appear to be very reluctant to receive those asylum seekers too, don't they. So it's not just the Australian Government that's having difficulties with this; the Indonesian authorities are also having their own internal struggle about what to actually do.
Does this mean the so-called Indonesian solution really is not a viable one?
O’CONNOR: The Government has never coined that phrase ever, can I say. This is a regional solution. We need the assistance of source, transit and destination countries. We need to work collaboratively under the Bali conference and the Lombok Treaty. We need to work with all our friends in the region to tackle this very challenging issue. And the only way we can do that is to work collaboratively, have our authorities - the Australian Federal police and the Indonesian National Police - work together with other police forces in the region to tackle people smugglers, to work very closely with the UNHCR and the International Organization for Migration in the region to help those people seeking asylum.
This is not - this cannot be solved by one country. It has to be a regional effort, solving a regional problem.
DELANEY: It's been reported that a significant number of the people on board the Oceanic Viking have already been in Indonesia for quite some time and have already been assessed as refugees, and yet have still been stuck with nowhere to go. Does that indicate that the - what's commonly called the queue, in other words formal channels, isn't working?
O’CONNOR: I think, firstly, it underlines that there are 42 million displaced people, 15 million of whom are recognised as refugees around the world. This is a global challenge. We have 15 million people. Australia - of course, the Australian Government assist in the resettlement of about 14,000 a year. We are signatories to that particular treaty. But it is a massive global challenge to deal with those issues.
In relation to the claims of those on the Oceanic Viking, until they are properly assessed by the UNHCR and other international agencies we cannot confirm that speculation.
DELANEY: Thanks very much for your time today.
O’CONNOR: Not at all. Thank you.
DELANEY: Brendan O'Connor, the Federal Minister for Home Affairs.
