By Jill Fraser
MELBOURNE
Monday came and went, but despite reports that the day could herald the beginning of Australia's much criticized policy of transferring its rejected refugees to Cambodia none appeared to have made the journey.
Refugee Action Coalition spokesperson Ian Rintoul told The Anadolu Agency that “the [expected] transfer has been delayed because so few refugees are interested in taking up the government’s package.”
The package, outlined in a letter circulated last week by the Australian Immigration Department to both refugees and asylum seekers, included a cash incentive, which Rintoul believes is up to $10,000.
It stated that the first flight to Cambodia could leave Monday.
A spokesperson for Immigration Minister Peter Dutton issued a statement to AA late Monday saying: “A Cambodian Government delegation is currently travelling to Nauru."
Nauru is the home of a detention center for Immigrants - many of them Muslim - denied entry to Australia. A Nov. 2012 Amnesty International report described the center as "a human rights catastrophe... a toxic mix of uncertainty, unlawful detention and inhumane conditions."
The statement added that the delegation would "be helping to progress arrangements for the first group of refugees to be transferred to Cambodia.”
Fairfax media reported that Phnom Penh had insisted on vetting refugees who agree to relocate under the $40 million deal that will see an unlimited number move to the Southeast Asian country.
All candidates must be bona fide refugees fleeing a well-founded fear of persecution in their home countries, it reported officials as saying.
The one-off package "to assist the resettlement process" outlined in the letter contained cash in hand and in a bank account, accommodation, insurance and a wide range of services such as language tuition.
It talked of the advantages of life in Cambodia: “Cambodia is a safe country, where police maintain law and order. It does not have problems with stray dogs,” it reads.
Rintoul told AA Monday that despite reports to the contrary, he could confirm only one asylum seeker had agreed to be in the first group to leave the Pacific island nation.
“I can confirm an Iranian male because I’ve spoken to him,” he said.
“I’ve been told that in addition there are three Tamils and one Rohingya male, but I can’t confirm these.”
Rintoul said his concern is that all the above are asylum seekers who have not yet had their refugee claims accepted.
The bilateral agreement between Australia and Cambodia, signed last September, stipulates that only genuine refugees who volunteer to go will qualify for relocation to Cambodia.
“Our concern is that they’re coercing asylum seekers into going with these packages and encouraging them to sign and implying that by signing they will become refugees,” Rintoul told AA.
“Technically the deal only applies to refugees and I don’t know of any refugee who has been approached.”
Fairfax Media reported that a spokesperson for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) had said that the agency will play no role in resettling refugees who have agreed to give up their hopes of life in Australia to resettle in Cambodia, one of the world's poorest nations.
"We are not playing a role in this relocation and our staffing structure in Phnom Penh remains unchanged," the spokesperson said.
On Sunday, Khieu Sopheak, a spokesman for the Cambodian Ministry of Interior, said no refugees from Nauru were expected to arrive for the next few days.
“We don’t know anyone [who has] volunteered so far,” he added.
