HRA MEDIA RELEASE: URGENT - SERCO LIES - PROTESTS AT CURTIN DETENTION CENTRE, HOSPITAL VISITS CANCELLED - GESTAPO PERFORMANCES - People are breaking down, and prepared to die.

HUMAN RIGHTS ALLIANCE:

http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/wa/10101351/detainees-denied-hospit...

http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/wa/10101352/detainees-denied-hospit...

I've been contacted from within Curtin - the two Asylum Seekers taken to Broome hospital yesterday were not taken there for specialist medical assistance emanating from any natural cause - SERCO and DIAC have misled everyone so as to cover up the situation at Curtin - they lied so we would not know of the mental despair leading to protests and people prepared to flee into the harshness of the remote, to risk death in the remote rather than the indignity of the concentration camp like experience that is Curtin - "Better to die than to live like this, this is not living, this is torture."

They were injured while protesting. The fact the police were there was they were called in by SERCO and DIAC to escort them so that they would be stopped from any desperation to flee.

Apparently, as I've on a number of occasions this week alerted news media to, tensions in Curtin have been rocket sky-high. SERCO has been waiting the whole of the last two weeks for Curtin to explode in various incidents, as they are fully aware of mental breakdowns and meltdowns. SERCO personnel have increased at Curtin and police have been advised to be on standby and nearby.

There have been Curtin Asylum Seekers on more than two weeks of hunger strikes during the month of August, with some of them collapsing and need hospitalisation at Derby Hospital, emaciated and with the risk of perfusion - organ failure.

During the last several nights tensions between Asylum Seekers and SERCO personnel were erupting.

Two Iranian Asylum Seekers, and several Hazara Asylum Seekers, were at breaking point and had made the defiant stand in the last week and walked out of Curtin however were pursued and returned. The other day as their mental despair grew they symbolically two of them attempted to escape and walked into the electric fence. I didn't know that Curtin had electrified any fences. Their screams of anguish and the seeking of freedom, of humanity, in the most remote of Australia's mandatory detention centres, were heard asunder by many of the Asylum Seekers who languish in prison that is Curtin.

Two others recently released after a year and a half in Curtin Detention Centre have told me that the mental and physical despair, the loss of faith and the loss of human endurance is nearing either mass protests the like not seen since Woomera and Baxter or tragically the loss of resilience and faith in the bureaucracies will end up very soon with more Curtin Detention Centre Deaths. They say people are being monitored not for their safety or for any human concern however to keep them obedient no matter the mental effects.

"They look at us like we are not here, we hunger strike, we sick, we cry, we die, we not there to them, they not see us, they don't care, some smile, this is more pain for us."

These two Asylum Seekers who may have left the prison that is Curtin were the two Asylum Seekers taken to Broome Hospital, and these two were to be treated there and the police and SERCO were separating them from public contact and the scrutiny of the world, to keep secret from the media the unrest and dangerous traumas of Curtin. Once Jackie, an off duty nurse, spoke to them, while at Broome Hospital, she was unbelievably threatened to not talk to them, 'that it is illegal' to talk to them! Their hospital visit was cancelled by SERCO and they were rushed back to Curtin so as to prevent the events at Curtin reaching the rest of Australia. How many truths are hidden from the public right to know, from the balances and checks that ensure propriety and the common good? How many? SERCO, and all our relevant authorities have been caught out in utter despicability.

Curtin Detention Centre's answer to human despair, to acute and abject trauma, to the manifest of clinical disorders, to people breaking down, to escalating tensions, to SERCO's inadequate skill sets, to their lack of qualified personnel, to the fact that far too many SERCO staff are under-qualified or untrained former Centrelink recipients WAS FOR THESE MEN AND OTHERS TO BE HANDCUFFED AND SENT TO THE NOTORIOUS CHRISTMAS ISLAND DETENTION CENTRE. A charter plane was once again in the midst of the clandestine organised to fly these human beings to the Island. They are now in the notorious Red Compound, punished for being human, treated like something straight out of Orwell's 1984 or Kafka - there are no complaints processes for them, no trials, no-one to know other than the slips of truth that emanate from other humanity dishevelled by these abuses of power and the ills of the contemporary Australian political landscape.

People in Curtin are despairing towards more protests, people are screaming through the night, whistling and falling on their knees, crying, and the cries coalesce and the tensions thread together, and SERCO personnel do not know what to do other than practice in clandestine and bullish ways.

The United Nations Observers, UN Special Rapporteurs, the Australian Human Rights Commission must enter Curtin and Christmas Island Detention Centres immediately. The Australian Greens and even the Coalition must demand a visiting investigative team into these Centres and into the plight of these peoples.
SERCO cannot continue to lie like this, and cannot treat people in these cruel and horrific ways when they are in need of medical attention, and cannot lie to the Australian public of what is happening in Detention Centres, and if the Australian Government is complicit or is the guiding hand then this must be exposed.

Gerry Georgatos
Convener, Human Rights Alliance
PhD Law Researcher, Australian Deaths in Custody
0430 657 309

Comments

From The Australian - reporter Debbie Guest:

THREATS to burn Curtin Detention Centre "to the ground" have seen seven detainees from the remote centre transferred in handcuffs to Christmas Island in a secretive high-security operation.

Two other asylum-seekers from Perth Detention Centre were also transferred to the island last night via a Department of Immigration and Citizenship charter plane.

Detainees among the nine transferred are believed to have made threats against a department manager at Curtin Detention Centre where tensions have spilled over in recent days.

Flammable materials have been removed from asylum-seeker compounds at the Kimberley centre after detainees made threats to burn it to the ground.

The Australian also understands two detainees recently jumped an internal fence at the centre and then became caught in a perimeter electric fence.

Guards at Curtin, which is housing around 1380 mainly Hazara Afghan men, have been on high alert for the past three nights.

Start of sidebar. Skip to end of sidebar.

Related Coverage
AFP allowed to use force on detainees The Australian, 31 Jul 2011
Christmas Island starts to downsize The Australian, 28 Jun 2011
Curtin carrying asylum-seeker burden The Australian, 24 Jun 2011
All ready but police brace for resistance The Australian, 15 May 2011
Detainees create unrest at airport The Australian, 12 May 2011
End of sidebar. Return to start of sidebar.

In an attempt to quell the disruption the department sent perceived troublemakers to the island around 8.20pm last night in what was a highly organised operation.

The nine men in handcuffs were escorted down the Strategic Airline plane’s steps one by one flanked by two security guards wearing black uniforms and black gloves. Many of the asylum -eekers appeared to be Middle Eastern and one man was not wearing shoes.

About half a dozen extra security officers stood at the foot of the plane watching the operation, which was performed quickly and saw the plane take off again with no one on board within 30 minutes.

The detainees were placed in three mini-buses sitting ready on the tarmac. Each detainee sat in the bus with two security guards surrounding them and they were driven to the island’s main detention centre.

The Australian understands the men transferred from Curtin were placed in the isolation block, known as red compound.

A spokesman for the department said last night it was not the first time detainees had been handcuffed. He said detention service provider Serco could make decisions on whether restraints were required and they felt there was a need on this occasion.

“From time to time we often transfer people throughout the detention network for operation reasons we don’t discuss,” he said.

He said the decision to transfer the nine men was based on “personal circumstances of the client”.

The spokesman said detainees were sent back to Christmas Island for a wide range of reasons include medical and the men would not be part of the Gillard government’s asylum-seeker swap deal with Malaysia.

From The Australian - reporter Debbie Guest:

THREATS to burn Curtin Detention Centre "to the ground" have seen seven detainees from the remote centre transferred in handcuffs to Christmas Island in a secretive high-security operation.

Two other asylum-seekers from Perth Detention Centre were also transferred to the island last night via a Department of Immigration and Citizenship charter plane.

Detainees among the nine transferred are believed to have made threats against a department manager at Curtin Detention Centre where tensions have spilled over in recent days.

Flammable materials have been removed from asylum-seeker compounds at the Kimberley centre after detainees made threats to burn it to the ground.

The Australian also understands two detainees recently jumped an internal fence at the centre and then became caught in a perimeter electric fence.

Guards at Curtin, which is housing around 1380 mainly Hazara Afghan men, have been on high alert for the past three nights.

Start of sidebar. Skip to end of sidebar.

Related Coverage
AFP allowed to use force on detainees The Australian, 31 Jul 2011
Christmas Island starts to downsize The Australian, 28 Jun 2011
Curtin carrying asylum-seeker burden The Australian, 24 Jun 2011
All ready but police brace for resistance The Australian, 15 May 2011
Detainees create unrest at airport The Australian, 12 May 2011
End of sidebar. Return to start of sidebar.

In an attempt to quell the disruption the department sent perceived troublemakers to the island around 8.20pm last night in what was a highly organised operation.

The nine men in handcuffs were escorted down the Strategic Airline plane’s steps one by one flanked by two security guards wearing black uniforms and black gloves. Many of the asylum -eekers appeared to be Middle Eastern and one man was not wearing shoes.

About half a dozen extra security officers stood at the foot of the plane watching the operation, which was performed quickly and saw the plane take off again with no one on board within 30 minutes.

The detainees were placed in three mini-buses sitting ready on the tarmac. Each detainee sat in the bus with two security guards surrounding them and they were driven to the island’s main detention centre.

The Australian understands the men transferred from Curtin were placed in the isolation block, known as red compound.

A spokesman for the department said last night it was not the first time detainees had been handcuffed. He said detention service provider Serco could make decisions on whether restraints were required and they felt there was a need on this occasion.

“From time to time we often transfer people throughout the detention network for operation reasons we don’t discuss,” he said.

He said the decision to transfer the nine men was based on “personal circumstances of the client”.

The spokesman said detainees were sent back to Christmas Island for a wide range of reasons include medical and the men would not be part of the Gillard government’s asylum-seeker swap deal with Malaysia.

Oh Lord, why are we doing this?

Nine Asylum Seekers have been treated with contempt and transferred to the criminality of Christmas Island Detention's Isolation Compounds.

Only a couple of weeks ago from Northern Immigration Detention Centre in Darwin three Asylum Seekers were treated with the contempt and abuses of power evidenced in recent weeks, the day before, yesterday and today at Curtin by DIAC and SERCO. They were shuttled to Christmas Island, to Red Block. These three young folk were surrounded and escorted by the heavy handedness of 30 Guards to ensure that these orchestrated images would reach the Australian peoples, to perceptually mofidy their views.

However on this occasion DIAC and SERCO had not weaved a story about them 'threatening to burn the place the down.' I am sure this will be the latest line, a mantra, that will be used to perceptually modify the views of the Australian community, to divide people.

The nine Asylum Seekers portrayed as criminals were handcuffed, escorted by two males on either side, dressed in black, with black gloves, with clinical sterility, stand-offishness as if to impute various threats, and to manufacture a legitimacy in our minds, about our Asylum Seekers. The criminals are SERCO, DIAC and most definitely Miss Gillard and Mr Bowen who masquarade as parliamentarians, and who are delivering Australia into the darkness of the worst racism and discrimination. This arbitrary abuse of power and this vacuum of inhumanity should be the fall of this Government however let us never forget who are the victims, who are the ones who suffer - our Asylum Seekers who are being maltreated by every inhumanity and having every aspersion unlawfully heaped upon them.

Miss Gillard and Mr Bowen have achieved a powerful legacy in that they have delivered more racism and discrimination than any of their contemporary predecessors. They are two of the worst examples of modern day Australian politicians and may the ALP be reduced to what it deserves at the very next election and the constituents of Australia send a powerful message to all other political parties that inhumanity is not permissible.

Gerry Georgatos

Convener, Human Rights Alliance,

PhD Law Researcher, Australian Deaths in Custody

0430 657 309