Paris Aristotle AM, Director of the Victorian Foundation for Survivors of Torture and one of Julia Gillard’s closest advisors on asylum seeker policy has warned more boat people will perish unless a complete regional solution is achieved to halt people-smuggling.
Mr Aristotle this week asked the government and opposition to adopt all 22 recommendations of the Angus Houston panel on asylum seeker policy, following Monday’s fatal boat capsize near Christmas Island.
Mr Aristotle, who was a member of the Houston panel, told ABC Radio: “It is absolutely certain there will be more deaths to come if we don’t get on with building a proper regional arrangement for dealing with this issue.
“There is no doubt there will be more tragedies.”
The government has been accused of failing to revise the Malaysian people-swap deal by providing more human rights protections, as recommended by the panel.
Mr Aristotle said the Malaysian deal, which the Coalition opposes, was a crucial component of the Houston plan.
“If we could make that arrangement work well, then you could negotiate with them (Malaysia) about expanding it, and if that worked well you could negotiate with countries like Indonesia,” he said.
The Opposition opposes the plan to send 800 asylum-seekers who arrive by boat to Malaysia in return for 4000 refugees on the grounds that Kuala Lumpur is not a signatory to the UN Convention on Refugees.
Mr Aristotle – who is chair of the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship’s Council on Asylum Seekers and Detention – said there were reports of boats going missing regularly, citing an incident two weeks ago when a capsized boat was spotted by plane. In that incident 60 people were rescued.
Independent MP Andrew Wilkie has called for more aid to be given to asylum seeker source countries such as Pakistan and Iran.
He said the government needs to intensify its efforts with transit countries like Indonesia and Thailand and declared that blaming the Coalition for blocking the Malaysia people-swap deal wasn’t good enough.
“Neither party has yet apparently come to realise that this is a really complex humanitarian problem,” Mr Wilkie told ABC radio.
“It’s not a simple border security.”
Mr Wilkie advocates using direct foreign aid to help improve conditions for potential asylum seekers within their own borders.