Asylum-seeker boat lands in Western Australia: Arrivals sent to Nauru

The 12 asylum-seekers apprehended by Australian Border Force officials in Western Australia on Wednesday have been flown to Nauru.

After initial processing in Darwin, the 12 individuals have been confirmed as unauthorised maritime arrivals.

The Australian understands they will remain in Nauru awaiting regional processing, which is consistent with Operation Sovereign Borders protocols that have been in place for more than a decade.

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton says Anthony Albanese has given people smugglers a green light to resume operations, warning the government’s dismantling of Operation Sovereign Borders could see “people drown at sea and kids end up back in detention”.

Mr Dutton, a former immigration and home affairs minister who oversaw Operation Sovereign Borders, on Friday accused the Prime Minister of a “catastrophic failure” after a vessel made landfall in Western Australia.

Attacking the government for not providing details about the group who arrived by boat on an isolated and rugged stretch of the Kimberley coastline, Mr Dutton said “this is the tenth venture (since Labor won the election) and the public is not hearing a lot about it at the moment”.

“The Albanese government dismantles Operation Sovereign Borders and the boats restart. Under this Prime Minister, he stops the economy but he starts the boats,” Mr Dutton told Ray Hadley on 2GB.

“The people smugglers have worked out there’s a Prime Minister who’s weak and doesn’t have the ability to stand up to people smuggling and the human tragedy if it starts again. People drown at sea and kids end up back in detention. It’s exactly what Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd did.”

After the government abolished Coalition-era temporary protection visas and watered-down other immigration enforcement powers, which Mr Dutton says creates a “pull-factor” for people smugglers, the Liberal leader warned “there’s a greater likelihood that these people now stay”.

“If you come from Afghanistan or Iran or other countries where the Albanese government determines you can’t be returned to, then the people smugglers are going to market that,” he said.

“(The people smugglers will) say … jump on the boat because look at what’s happened with the High Court, you can get an outcome in Australia which means you might be in immigration detention for a few months, or even a couple of years, but eventually you’ll get back out into the community and you’ll be given a permanent visa.

“That’s exactly what the government has created. It’s a huge mess and it’s a pull factor for these people smugglers who are selling their wares again. Tragically, people drown at sea as a result, you don’t know who is coming into our country and the Prime Minister has sent all of the wrong messages and signals from the first day he was elected.”

After the Albanese government was last week forced by the Coalition into rushing through emergency powers legislation in response to a High Court ruling on indefinite detention, Mr Dutton said Australians were “shaking their heads at this government at the moment”.

“It’s just not the action of a competent government and I think the training wheels (are) well and truly falling off this Prime Minister and I think a lot of people are really shaking their heads as to how the Prime Minister could put Australians at risk the way that he is currently.

“There are now 340 more people it seems that can get out into the community and the government has no answers.”

Mr Dutton said the government had since June to “deal with this matter and they came into the parliament saying … you can’t pass legislation, we’re just bound by the High Court decision”.

“Then as it turns out you can pass legislation but they wrote the legislation overnight in a very hasty fashion and if that is the way they conduct themselves then they leave themselves open to greater legal risk.”

“If you’ve got a competent minister and a competent Prime Minister … they take the lead, they have a national security committee discussion to iron out all these problems. The government just hasn’t done that because people like Andrew Giles and Clare O’Neil and other people from the hard left of the Labor Party don’t believe that these people should be in immigration detention.

“So, they’re happy to hide behind the outcome of the court and say we tried, we couldn’t do anything … we’ve got to release these people, that’s in accordance to their human rights needs.

And they completely and utterly forget about the victims and future victims of some of these individuals.”

Hitting back at Mr Dutton, Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil told The Australian that “national security is the first priority of our government”.

Ms O’Neil accused Mr Dutton of being a “reckless politician who will do and say anything to score political points – even if it puts the national security of Australians at risk”.

“As security agencies have repeatedly warned, inflammatory language has a direct link to increased risk of violence. Everyone in our parliament needs to consider the impact that their language will have,” Ms O’Neil said.

“Our government is careful and deliberate about how we discuss national security issues and especially operational matters. No political objective should ever come before the security of our country and the integrity of the operations and agencies that protect us every day.

“Whether it’s the conflict in the Middle East, tensions at home, Operation Sovereign Borders or even the highly sensitive security operations involved in individuals returning from conflict, there’s nothing Peter Dutton won’t use for his own political ends.”

Education Minister Jason Clare on Friday said an investigation into the boat arrival was underway.

“We don’t comment on Operation Sovereign Borders matters. I just make the general point that if people seek to come to Australia by boat, the boat is either turned back, or people are returned to their country of origin, or they’re settled in a third country,” Mr Clare said.

“That was the position under the former government, it’s the same position under this government.”

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/dutton-says-pm-has-given-people-smugglers-a-green-light/news-story/cc239c0c04d0d38018054ac710bdfa3b

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