[A-List] Australia news: racism and political crisis

["Keaney Michael" <Michael.Keaney@xxxxxx>]

How Australia's get-tough government censored pictures
 of asylum-seekers to gain re-election

 By Kathy Marks in Brisbane

 The Independent, 19 February 2002

 The photograph, showing children in life jackets floating in the
 Indian Ocean, was political dynamite. Released during last
 year's Australian election campaign, it appeared to provide
 conclusive evidence that Iraqi asylum-seekers threw their
 children overboard after their fishing boat was turned back by
 an Australian warship.

 This account of heinous parental conduct on the high seas was
 given by John Howard's government at the beginning of the
 campaign and used to justify its crackdown on boat people
 from Afghanistan and the Middle East. The explosive claims
 were repeated up until election day. "I don't want people like
 that in Australia," Mr Howard declared.

 His right-wing government was returned to office in November,
 its political fortunes transformed by its new tough stance on
 the asylum issue. That startling photograph, which fixed itself
 in the public consciousness, played no small part in the
 outcome. But other pictures, published yesterday by the
 Labour Opposition, cast a different light on events.

 They clearly show that children were not in the water because
 they were tossed in by their heartless parents, but because the
 fishing boat had sunk. And the photographs were not taken
 during the confrontation with HMAS Adelaide, as the
 government claimed. They were taken the next day, while the
 asylum-seekers were being rescued by the Adelaide's crew off
 Christmas Island, an offshore territory.

 An election campaign already regarded as one of the dirtiest in
 Australian history was even more sordid than it appeared at the
 time.

 Not content with vilifying vulnerable people for political gain, the
 government at worst concealed - at best ignored - evidence
 that contradicted its story. The cover-up is convulsing
 Australia, with the opposition and the media insisting it casts
 serious doubt on Mr Howard's credibility and the legitimacy of
 his election victory.

 He and his ministers claim they were left in the dark by naval
 officials and senior public servants who apparently felt there
 was no need to tell their political masters the publicised
 account of the incident was incorrect. But each day the trail of
 responsibility edges closer to the politicians, and the
 photographs, taken by the Adelaide's crew, might prove their
 undoing.

 Yesterday the Defence Minister, Robert Hill, admitted that five
 photographs showing the wider picture of events in the Indian
 Ocean were e-mailed to the office of his predecessor, Peter
 Reith, and sent to his advisers. Mr Reith has retired.

 And Miles Jordana, a senior adviser to Mr Howard, was warned
 before the election by Mr Reith's office that doubts were
 circulating about the veracity of the "children overboard" claims.
 Mr Jordana did not pass on those doubts to the Prime Minister,
 he says, because he regarded them as unsubstantiated
 rumours.

 As the opposition leader, Simon Crean, observed yesterday, no
 such reticence was exercised in relation to the initial reports,
 which Philip Ruddock, the Immigration Minister, rushed to bring
 to the attention of a shocked public, without checking them
 with authoritative sources.

 Most people had no problem believing them. For months, the
 government had been demonising asylum-seekers as
 queue-jumpers, economic migrants and terrorists attempting to
 slip into Australia in leaky boats. But scepticism was
 expressed in some quarters, and so the photographs - the
 ones that appeared to back up the claims - were published
 three days later.

 The pictures, said Mr Reith, "show absolutely, without question
 whatsoever, that there were children in the water". (That much
 is true.) Mr Reith also said he had a videotape that supported
 his account. Later, when told by defence officials that it did not
 show children being thrown overboard, he replied: "Well, we'd
 better not see the video then." The truth has not come out
 because the government had a change of heart. Naval officers
 tried to blow the whistle discreetly during the election
 campaign. When they failed, the chief of the navy,
 Vice-Admiral David Shackleton, took the brave step of telling
 the media that the story was wrong.

 Mr Howard had no choice but to order an inquiry, and two
 damning reports on the incident were tabled last week. On the
 same day, by coincidence, a separate inquiry dismissed
 government claims that Afghan asylum-seekers at Woomera
 detention centre sewed their children's lips together during a
 recent hunger strike. The teenagers did it themselves.

 There are signs that the tide of public opinion is beginning to
 turn. While most people still approve of Australia's hardline
 refugee policy, an opinion poll two days ago found that 51 per
 cent of respondents believed the government acted
 dishonourably during the campaign.

 Respected newspapers such as The Australian agree. As it
 wrote in an editorial last weekend: "During an election
 campaign fought on the issue of asylum-seekers, John
 Howard, Philip Ruddock and Peter Reith peddled falsehoods
 about boat people, then failed to correct their slurs even when
 public servants at the highest levels knew the truth." Yesterday
 Australia's most senior civil servant, Max Moore-Wilton,
 defended the original version of events. Mr Moore-Wilton, head
 of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, told a Senate
 inquiry: "I am not aware that children have not been thrown
 overboard. It has not been established that children were not
 thrown overboard."

 The Alice in Wonderland saga continues.

full article at:
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/australasia/story.jsp?story=134153

Michael Keaney
Mercuria Business School
Martinlaaksontie 36
01620 Vantaa
Finland

michael.keaney@xxxxxx