Australian spy agency urged to reveal case against Tamil refugees

Alexandra Kirk, Linda Mottram

Last Updated: Thu, 14 Jan 2010 09:36:00 +1100

Lawyers and refugee advocates are calling for Australia's spy agency ASIO to reveal why five Sri Lankans being held on Christmas Island have been deemed a security threat.

Five Sri Lankan asylum seekers detained on Christmas Island have been given adverse security assessments by ASIO and have been refused Australian visas.

Four of the asylum seekers were picked up by Australian customs ship, the Oceanic Viking last year and were hoping to be re-settled in Australia.

The fifth person arrived on a boat months earlier.

All five have been recognised as refugees, which means they cannot be sent back to Sri Lanka.

Refugee lawyer David Manne says ASIO can make mistakes, and its decisions should be independently scrutinised.

"It's crucial that there be independent scrutiny of any assessments by ASIO because what we do know and the fact is that ASIO has made some serious mistakes in the past," he said.

"[The mistakes] can result in many many years of detention of people who are very vulnerable and may well have already experienced significant trauma in their lives."

National interest

But Australia's former Attorney-General, Philip Ruddock says it's in the national interest not to release the findings of adverse security checks on asylum seekers.

Mr Ruddock says releasing ASIO's findings would jeopardise intelligence gathering.

"The way in which those assessments might be of interest to advocates who'd like to traverse them without regard to whether or not it would harm the national interest.

My view is that the Australian community would expect that the security organisation should be able to make those judgements unfettered."

Flawed process

But former Australian diplomat, Bruce Haigh, whose postings included the Australian High Commission in Colombo, has criticised ASIO and the likely basis for the intelligence assessment on the five Tamils.

He says the process is flawed.

"When I was in the High Commission in Sri Lanka one of the things we were asked to do by the Australian Department of Immigration was to check out refugee applicants to make sure that they didn't have an adverse security background"

"That entailed going to the Sri Lankan police, the Sinhalese police, and seeking a police clearance which was absolute nonsense because if these people were on the other side in a civil war, why would you go to just one party and ask them about the security rating of somebody applying for refugee status."

"So it was always going to be and always has been a flawed process and that's what's happened in this instance I'd say."

Mr Haigh says ASIO would have continued that practice of speaking only to Sri Lankan authorities.

He says he believes the group would have been found to have Tamil Tiger connections and therefore would have been deemed to be a terrorist threat.

But Mr Haigh says there's no experience or evidence of Tamils in Australia, including those with Tamil Tiger connections, being other than good citizens.