Deported For Trying To Address The Serious Problem Of Asylum Seekers From Sri Lanka
BRIAN SENEWIRATNE
MA(Cantab), MBBChir(Cantab),MBBS (Hons) (Lond) MD(Lond), FRCP(Lond), FRACP
Consultant Physician
292 Pine Mt Rd
Mt Gravatt
Australia 4122
tel 07 33496118
Mob 0419335334
Fx 07. 33434306
Email bsenewiratne@gmail.com
14 December 2012
Deported for trying to address the serious problem of
Asylum seekers from Sri Lanka
Hon Julia Gillard
Prime Minister ofAustralia
Office of the Prime Minister
Canberra
ACT 2600
Dear Prime Minister,
I am an 81 year old Consultant Specialist Physician, who has been an Australiac itizen for 36 years. I have had a long-standing interest in human rights, in particular, the unresolved problem of asylum seekers and the way they are treated.
What Australia is doing is a violation of the UN Refugee Convention, the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, signed and ratified by Australia. It is also a violation of the Australian Migration Act and even the Australian Constitution 1901(Section 75(V)).
I have been particularly concerned about the so-called ‘push-factors’ which make people seek asylum in Australia and other countries.
The problem of asylum seekers trying to get to Australia has also created problems in Malaysia and Indonesia. Moreover, as you well know, there have also been attempts to use these countries (and others) as off shore detention centres for asylum seekers. This is illegal.
Concerned Malaysians invited me to address two meetings in Malaysia(15th December 2012 in Johor, and the following day in Kuala Lumpur). Since Johor is literally next to Singapore, it made sense to fly to Singapore and take a coach to Johor.
On arrival in Singapore on the 14th December (today), I was refused admission, held incommunicado in a locked room for five hours without even basic amenities such as food or water, or facilities such as a toilet, and deported by an armed policeman to the flight back to Brisbane.
My request for the return of my passport, a fundamental right, was refused. It was only given back to me in Brisbane, and that too after a significant delay.
Singaporere fused my right to travel to Malaysia or to Indonesia, which is not only high-handed but illegal. Singapore could stop me entering that country, but had no right to stop me from getting to another country.
This is a serious problem that has already generated national and international concern. I hope it will be taken up in the Australian parliament after the recess.
I am entitled to an explanation. As a citizen of this country, and you, as the Prime Minister, have a duty to get this for me, if being an Australian citizen is to have any meaning.
The date of this letter is correct since it was written on the way back home. The delay in sending it to you is that I have rarely written a letter in anger, but have allowed a ‘cooling off’ period to lapse, and to also try and make sense of this senseless act.
I will set out in detail what was done to me. I will first give a brief account of who I am and what I was trying to do. This should not be necessary, since no citizen of this country should be treated like this.
My position Read More