BY EMMA CORCORAN
"Mohammad" spends his days in his bedroom. He used to watch TV or write to friends, but now he says, "I'm just sitting. Sitting and thinking." He's an Iranian asylum seeker living in an Australian detention centre. Mohammad wasn't granted refugee status here, but is too frightened to return to his homeland because he's a Christian — a "crime" punishable by death in Iran.
Mohammad is just one of hundreds of asylum seekers who've been denied asylum but are too frightened to go home. These people live in detention centres — an unreal existence where they're physically in Australia (speaking English and eating barbecued sausages), but legally in no-man's-land.
The Australian government is sick and tired of them. So it has developed a plan to get rid of the largest group — the 127 Iranian asylum seekers who have no appeals pending in the courts.
On March 12, immigration minister Philip Ruddock announced that the Australian government had just signed a memorandum of understanding with the Islamic Republic of Iran. In this deal, Iran said it would accept asylum seekers forcibly deported back, in exchange for a cultural program allowing affluent young Iranians to come and experience the Australian lifestyle.
The deal was described by Ruddock as "historic", because until now the Iranian government has refused to accept forcibly deported asylum seekers. Iran has an unemployment rate of 30%, so it'e reluctant to accept back the tens of thousands asylum seekers that Europe is desperate to deport.
This agreement with Australia will leave the Iranian government open to pressure from European countries seeking similar deals. The 127 Iranians in Australia would be a trickle compared to the flood of asylum seekers that could follow. Australia's offer of visas for a few hundred Iranian youths is no recompense for this type of financial and political burden.
So why did the Iranians sign the agreement? It's difficult to know, because no one has seen it. "They aren't releasing the details of it to anyone, including parliament", says "Mary", a refugee advocate and friend of Mohammad's.
A representative of the Iranian Embassy, Eshagh al Habib, who visited the Baxter detention centre on May 15, was also unwilling to produce a copy of the agreement. Asylum seekers requesting to see it reported being told, "I am here in the flesh. This is better proof than any piece of paper. You should trust me."
During the discussion, al Habib mentioned personal details about the detainees that they hadn't told him. "He told them the department of immigration had passed on details about them to the Iranian government", said Mary. "Many of these Iranians are political dissidents. If any information was released they'd face severe consequences once deported."
"I think they gave our name and information to the Iranian Embassy", said Mohammed, speaking on the phone from the Baxter detention centre. "Everyone is worried."
In an article from the May 28 Australian Financial Review, a spokesperson for Ruddock denied handing over any more than "passport information, village of origin and their health check information". However, asylum seekers from the Baxter detention centre have said that al Habib was in possession of more information than this.
It's not in the Australian government's best interests to pass on details to the Iranian regime, because it has served only to make the asylum seekers more resistant to deportation. So why would they do it?
The only reason refugee advocates can offer is that it forms part of the deal signed with the Iranians. "This", postulates Mary, "may be the reason that no-one has seen the secret agreement."
The other possibility is that the Iranian government may have signed the agreement because they are desperate to increase trade with Western countries, in particular, Western countries closely allied to the United States.
In the week beginning May 26, the Iranian delegation of the Australian-Iranian Parliamentary Friendship Group toured Australia. They came to visit the CSIRO, BHP, the Australian Wheat Board, and meet the ministers for immigration, foreign affairs and trade.
This visit follows a trip made to Iran last September by trade minister Mark Vaile, and a delegation of representatives from 34 Australian companies. "The Iranian Government is very anxious to develop and expand their mining sector", said Vaile during the trip. "The attractiveness of Australia is that we've been at the leading edge of developing new technology in mining."
Iran is particularly keen to buddy up to close allies of the United States because the US has recently cut all diplomatic ties with Iran. Last week's CNN poll asked, "Should the US take steps to destabilise Tehran's Islamic regime?"
Another possibility is that the agreement between Australia and Iran is a secret because it doesn't exist. The threat of forced deportation may be a hoax, a bluff created solely to scare the Iranians into accepting a deportation package of a few thousand dollars and leaving peacefully.
They were given 28 days to accept the money, or face forced deportation. Their time runs out next week, but only three have capitulated.
"We didn't come here for money", Mohammad tells me. "There are jobs and money in Iran. But I cannot live there."
His voice becomes insistent. "I will sell my life for $2000? No. I do not want money."
The asylum seekers are now as frightened of the Australian government as they are of the fundamentalist regime they escaped from.
"We will be delivered to our enemy like sheep to wolf", they wrote, in a letter to the Australian public. Mohammad now takes three sleeping tablets a night. "Our life is stress", he tells me. "We can't sleep, we can't eat. I can't see the sky."
Why are these asylum seekers fighting so desperately for a life in an Australian detention centre?
"Iran is Muslim, but I changed to Christian. So I had to leave", says Mohammad. "If you change religion they kill you. The best life is in Iran, but unfortunately our government is really, really bad."
It seems it doesn't take much effort to engage the wrath of Iran's religious leaders. Last month, Britain's Guardian newspaper reported that an Iranian actress was sentenced to 74 lashes for kissing a young actor on the cheek at a public festival.
If a kiss on the cheek is enough to earn a whipping, what will be the fate of these 128 Iranian asylum seekers, many of whom claim to be outspoken critics of the Iranian regime?
Barbara Rogalla is a former nurse at Woomera. "When I was there, an Iranian volunteered to go back to Iran", she says. "I asked him 'Why would you go back, when you know you're going to jail?' And he told me, 'I'm in jail here. At least there my family can visit me.'"
Before working in Woomera, Rogalla had never been particularly interested in the plight of refugees, but she's now a human rights activist. "I think there's a high probability these Iranians will either go to jail or be tortured or killed. When Ruddock says 'these people aren't refugees', this really means they haven't passed the stringent requirements Australia has. The process is designed to keep people out."
A last-minute federal court appeal to stop the deportations has been lodged. On March 29, an interim injunction was granted, which lawyers and refugee advocates are hoping will stop any deportations before the result of the test case is known. This should take three to four weeks, says Julian Burnside QC, a member of the legal team lodging the federal court appeal.
In detention centres around Australia, the Iranians sit. And wait. All they know is that their lives are being put at risk by secret dealings between the country they fled to, and the country they fled from.
If Iran has signed the agreement to enhance their trade relations with Australia, then we have a government not only eager to enter into trading agreements with a country in the axis of evil, but happy to use this country's desire for trade to bargain the lives of asylum seekers.
If it's true that the Australian government fed information to the Iranian regime as part of the deal, then our leaders could easily be described as murderous. Even if the agreement proves to be only an elaborate hoax, this government will be still exposed as lying and manipulative.
However, unless the Australian government bows to increased pressure and releases details of this memorandum of understanding we may never know the truth.
For Mohammad, all that is important is that he thinks he'll be sent home to jail or execution. "We don't know what will happen in next two days", he says. Mary rings him every morning. "I'd love to give Mohammad some hope", she says. "But what can I say without lying?"
[The real names of Mary and Mohammad have been withheld to protect Mohammad from repercussions for speaking to Â鶹´«Ã½ Weekly. Emma Corcoran is a member of Rural Australians for Refugees. Visit RAR at . The Anti-Deportation Alliance web site is at ]
From Â鶹´«Ã½ Weekly, June 4, 2003.
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