2013-06-17 Human Rights Under Labor opinion piece – final as published

2nd National Settlement Conference Creating Our Future, Adelaide
It was a pleasure to participate in the above conference.
Conference program cover and my short address Education Is The Rock On Which Community Capacity Is Builtare provided below.

2012-06-27 CREATING OUR FUTURE CONFERENCE PROGRAM ADELAIDE

2012-06-27 Speech for CREATING OUR FUTURE CONF 2012 Adelaide

Keynote to the NATIONAL MEDIATION CONFERENCE 2012 “Emerging dynamics in mediation – new thinking, new practices and new relationships”

Sev participated in the above conference and delivered a keynote; see:

• Conference Program Cover: 2  012-09-11 National Mediation Conference Program
• Keynote address “Australia – emergence of a modern nation built on diversity and ‘fair go’”. (in printed form);   2012-11.01 – FAIR GO – Published
• link to the talk as delivered (audio) : http://www.leadr.com.au/podcasts/sev-ozdowski-nmc12.mp3

Her Excellency Ms Penelope Wensley AC, Governor of Queensland, launched a book entitled: Activating Human Rights and Peace – Theories, Practices and Contexts that was edited by Professor Goh Bee Chen, Associate Professor Baden Offord and Mr Rob Garbutt and published by Ashgate Publishing in England at Queensland Government House in Brisbane on 24^th October 2012.

The book is a collection of papers presented at The Activating Human Rights and Peace International Conference in Byron Bay, 1-4 July 2008.  My conference keynote address “Human Rights and the Beijing Olympics” was published as Chapter 9 in the book (pp. 119-141).

FREE CHINA: The Courage to Believe tells the powerful stories of two individuals who stood up to the Chinese communist government for their beliefs. For taking their stance, they were imprisoned and tortured by the Chinese government.

Since its completion earlier this year, FREE CHINA: The Courage to Believe has won major awards at film festivals. After seeing this film, Margaret Chew Barringer, founder of www.AmericanINSIGHT.org, commented: “I hope this film changes our world.”

It is a remarkably moving film. See attached for screening details.

ECARD_FreeChina_KingSt

ECARD_PittSt_FreeChina

ECARD_Ryde_FreeChina

There is less than one month to the biggest Australian ADR conference yet with a program incorporating more than 100 presenters over 3 days of conference and 2 days of workshops. It will start on Monday 10 September, with the Advanced Practice Clinic on Friday 14 September

The speakers Australia’s pre-eminent ADR conference brings together like-minded               professionals from around the globe.  From the US we have keynote speaker Robert Benjamin, as well as Bill Eddy and Jim Cyngler.  Fredrike Bannink from the Netherlands is known throughout Europe, the US and Canada for her mediation skills and  training sessions.  Hear what is happening in Belgium, China, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Colombia and throughout  Australia.  Learn about working with our indigenous communities from Max Harrison, Paul Newman, Ippei Okazaki and               Raymond Brazil.  Hear what can happen when young people get involved in settling disputes – from Lyn Doppler, former Principal of Rozelle Public School, and from one of the schools engaged in the NSW Law Society’s Mock Mediation program.

I was invited to speak on the topic “Why Australia is afried of Asylum Seekers”.

Check out for details on: www.mediationconference.com.au or write to: info@mediationconference.com.au

(Washington, DC) August 17, 2012 – The Australianparliament’s swift approval of an “offshore processing”law marks a shift in refugee policy that appears arbitrary anddiscriminatory on its face.

The Migration Legislation Amendment(Offshore Processing and Other Measures) Bill 2011, passed by the Senate onAugust 16, 2012, and by the House the previous day, authorizes the transferof asylum seekers who arrive by boat to remote Pacific islands, where theywill remain indefinitely while their refugee claims are processed.

“Australia’s new offshore processing law is a giantstep backward in the treatment of refugees and asylum seekers,” saidBill Frelick, refugee program director, “Australia again seeks toshunt desperate boat people to remote camps, perhaps for years, to punishthem for arriving uninvited by sea.”

The new lawauthorizes the government to transfer irregular migrants arriving by sea tothe Pacific country of Nauru or to Manus Island, a remote malarial islandthat is part of Papua New Guinea. The legislation was rushed through theHouse and Senate just days after a government-appointed panel of expertsissued a 22-point plan for addressing the issue of asylum seekers whoarrive by boat.

While the legislation adopted the panel’srecommendation to reinstate offshore processing, it did not include most ofthe panel’s other recommendations, many of which were geared towardimproving the capacity of Australia, transit countries, and sourcecountries to provide asylum seekers with safe alternatives to irregularboat departures. The House rejected an amendment that would have set aone-year limit on the time asylum seekers could be held at the offshoresites.

The legislation only targets asylum seekers who arriveirregularly by boat. The claims of asylum seekers who arrive by air, evenwith improper documents, will continue to be processed while they remain inAustralia. In most cases they will continue to be given “bridgingvisas,” which allow them to live and work in the community.

“People escaping persecution often have good reasons not to ask theauthorities for permission to travel before they flee,” Frelick said.“To set up a system that discriminates against asylum seekers justbecause they arrive irregularly by boat flies in the face of both basicfairness and fundamental refugee protection principles.”

In July 2011 Australia announced an “arrangement” to transferirregular maritime asylum seekers to Malaysia, but Australia’s HighCourt halted that plan, finding that the arrangement contravened therequirement in section 198A of Australia’s Migration Act to provideaccess to effective procedures for asylum.

The court found thatsince Malaysia had not ratified the 1951 Refugee Convention and had nodomestic refugee law, it was not legally bound to provide access toeffective asylum procedures and protection for refugees, and that theAustralian minister for immigration and citizenship, therefore, could notsend asylum seekers there.

After the High Court ruling, theLabor government was unable to win parliamentary support for legislation toamend the Migration Act to revive the Malaysia deal because the oppositionLiberal Party preferred offshore processing at Nauru and Manus Island. Butthe government found common ground with the opposition this week when bothagreed to enable offshore processing at Nauru and Manus Island by scrappingsection 198A of the Migration Act, circumventing the High Court ruling.

The new law adds that “the designation of a country to be anoffshore processing country need not be determined by reference to theinternational obligations or domestic law of that country.”

Refugee processing was closed at Manus Island in 2004 and at Nauru in2008 after the so-called “Pacific Solution” was criticized forbeing both costly and inhumane. Nauru Island became a party to the RefugeeConvention in 2011, but has not yet demonstrated its capacity to provideeffective asylum procedures and refugee protection, two additional criteriaset forth by the High Court for compliance with section 198A. Papua NewGuinea is also a party to the convention, but it has entered manyreservations to it and also lacks a national refugee determinationprocedure.

Australia’s prime minister, Julia Gillard,said that asylum seekers could be sent to Nauru as early as September wherethey would initially live in tents, and could be expected to wait there aslong as five years for their applications to be processed.

Gillard’s minister for immigration and citizenship, Chris Bowen,should not designate any countries for offshore processing, since thelegislation, on its face, is discriminatory and is almost certain to resultin arbitrary detention.

“Parliament may have skirted theHigh Court’s ruling by cutting human rights protection from theMigration Act, but not the principle on which the ruling rested,”Frelick said. “Should this plan go forward, Australia will beshirking its obligations under the Refugee Convention by punishing asylumseekers based on their arrival and indefinitely detaining them offshorewhere their rights won’t be ensured.”

Human Rights Watch Press release