ONE STEP CLOSER TO DEPORTATION

Despite completing their sentences, and a finding that their continued detention is a breach of human rights, 3O Vietnamese refugees remain in prison pending deportation some day to Vietnam. Peter Williamson reports on their continuing struggle to return to their homes and families.

Mr Pham sits in Parramatta Jail. He faces no charge, has no release date, no parole, and is not under sentence for any crime. For more than two years he has been waiting for news of a fate that lies out of his hands, locked in a stalemate of international diplomacy.

Mr Pham is no stranger to suffering. A refugee from Vietnam, he arrived in Australia aged 14 after five years in a Philippine refugee camp, to face a range of personal and social problems that contributed to him becoming a drug addict. He was convicted of various drug-related robberies in 1991. He completed his sentence in April 1999, but has not been released. The Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs has decided that he is no longer wanted in Australia. As a Vietnamese citizen, he can be deported, but Vietnam refused to take him back.

Following complaints by Mr Pham and nine other detainees, the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (HREOC) found that the length of detention of the complainants is “plainly unpredictable, indefinite and indeterminate”. As such, there has been a breach of human rights and the Commission recommended that the complainants be released from detention pending their deportation.

The Government remains indifferent to the Commission’s recommendations, and Mr Pham’s plight evokes little sympathy. He has been imprisoned and served eight years in a New South Wales prison. “Fair enough”, many will say. But he’s done his time, plus two years beyond his sentence. Fairfield councillor Thang Ngo says that the Vietnamese community is unwilling to speak out in support of the detainees, for fear of appearing soft on the drugs trade which has tarnished the community’s image in Australia. He says, however, that in accepting refugees, Australia should accept “the good with the bad”.

Now the stalemate may have eased, and the situation is one step nearer to resolution. Not a resolution, however, which will offer much comfort to the detainees or their family. Australia has recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Vietnam, establishing a process for deporting Vietnamese nationals.

According to the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs (DIMA) there are thirty Vietnamese in Australian jails who, like Mr Pham, are awaiting deportation after having completed sentences. Few details have been released, but it is understood that the Vietnamese Government will want to make detailed village-level background checks on these people, before accepting them as deportees.

The deportation of refugees raises a number of concerns. Firstly, the detainees, having fled Vietnam, were found to have a well-founded fear of persecution upon their return. Their deportation would divide their families and place further stress and suffering onto families who have already suffered through the Vietnam War, flight from Vietnam, and the difficulties of resettlement in Australia. Some have suffered far more - loss of family members, torture and persecution.

The battle for rehabilitation and to establish stable lives in Australia is ongoing and life-long for some people. That some should fall into drug abuse is hardly surprising. This is a problem within all communities in Australia, and not one for which people should be continuously punished. Their friends, their families, and their support structures are in Australia. They have been in Australia for most of their lives, and many have little to return to in Vietnam.

The refugees who have committed crimes have served their sentences and should be allowed to be rehabilitated within the community. Deportation will most likely result in life-long hardship and isolation, and quite possibly in persecution by a government they have already rejected and from which they have fled. Despite the most serious of outcomes resting on these cases, there is no legal aid for detainees who wish to appeal deportation decisions. Many of these people are forced to represent themselves in court, with limited English language skills and inadequate understanding of the legal process being played out.

Australian law allows for permanent residents, who have not taken out Australian, citizenship to be deported. For many of the detainees, taking out citizenship is a step which had never seemed important or which never occurred to them. One detainee, Tran Thanh Tuan applied, had his citizenship application approved, but was unable to complete the process because he had been arrested.

Peta Cowell of Justice Action, a prisoners’ rights group in Sydney, says that one prisoner complained that the State Office Compliance Officer has not visited for four to five months. According to DIMA, the officer is supposed to visit every 30 days. Furthermore, when an officer does visit, it is always a different person, and on the last visit there was no interpreter.

She also states that DIMA sent a letter to the brother of one Parramatta detainee in which they said that the prisoner could be taken away at any time. The prisoner himself has received no information at all. She says that the prisoners have not been informed of what is happening, either by DIMA or the Vietnamese Embassy. They are confused, anxious and worried. She also states that one of the Parramatta prisoners is in an extreme state of distress, not eating, depressed and suicidal.

Holding detainees who are not under sentence is improper and some lawyers believe it is also illegal. The detentions may well compound emotional problems and suffering at a time when help is most needed.