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7:30 interviews asylum seekers forced back to Indonesia

An ABC investigation has penetrated Operation Sovereign Borders, the govt’s policy to stop asylum seeker boats from reaching Australia.

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2014-03-17_1501If the ABC’s current standing with government ministers over asylum seekers was already tenuous, it could be about to take another step.

Tonight ABC investigation has penetrated the veil of secrecy over Operation Sovereign Borders, the government’s controversial policy to stop asylum seeker boats from reaching Australia.

7:30 will air two reports, one tonight and another later this week.

7.30 has obtained exclusive interviews with passengers onboard one of the first asylum-seeker boats to be intercepted and stopped after reaching Australian waters. The passengers provide a graphic and dramatic account of being transferred to one of the new high-tech orange life-boats now being used to send asylum-seekers back to Indonesia.

“When we arrive and Customs come inside our wooden boat, I just ask them ‘Please, please, help us. Would you please take us in a safe place? They just shouted at me, ‘Shut up! Shut up! Sit down!’”, Iranian Arash Sedigh told 7.30.

Passengers describe how one asylum-seeker threatened to kill Australian personnel if they didn’t provide a doctor to treat sick passengers and a pregnant woman, and others physically resisted the efforts of Australian personnel to send them back to Indonesia. They say Australian officials then resorted to force to get them onto the orange boat.

Mr Sedigh’s wife, Azi, told 7.30: “I was just screaming, I kept saying ‘this boat of yours is not suitable for me to board it… I was holding to the sides of the boat that they took us to… I was just screaming but the only thing they did was to pull me forcefully towards that boat’”.

Despite the extraordinary secrecy surrounding turn-back and tow-back operations, the ABC has obtained exclusive footage, not previously broadcast, which reveals the operational reality behind Operation Sovereign Borders, including its use of the controversial orange life boats.

“I asked them, ‘We will die in this orange boat, it’s not suitable for passing the ocean,” Mr Sedigh said. “They told me, ‘that’s not our problem, that’s yours. If you die in the Indonesian water, (it) makes Indonesian government in trouble and responsible. That’s not our problem.’”

The story will air at 7.30 tonight on ABC1. Part two will air later this week.

7 Responses

  1. I regret to point out a hidden agenda that would feed negative attitudes toward refugees among misinformed Australians.

    Broadcasting ‘f*** Australia’ and vengeful comments connecting to September 11 should have been left out I think the majority of Asylum seekers would feel despair and hopelessness in the face of our country’s systematic rejection.

    I think the question of whether the gentleman will try and reach Australia again was loaded. He answered that he wouldn’t try and enter Australia again after two failed attempts. Does that mean Australia’s Operation Boarder Security is effective in deterring asylum seekers from seeking our protection? I suppose so. But I would be prouder if I were part of a country who instead welcomed such strong determined people, not crush their spirits with countless turn backs and horrendous indefinite periods of detention.

  2. Sorry but you are very wrong Pertinax.

    The ABC was not “too lazy”, they asked the government who gave them nothing, they asked the Indonesian Police who confirmed the story. If the Government was so concerned about correct information perhaps they should have given it instead of acting like a dictatorship and simply stop reporting problems.

    All the ABC got wrong was ” early wording “, nothing else, the Government used this to push its agenda, nothing else.

  3. And as ABC said – very hard to report both sides of the story when one side won’t talk. How long, in minutes, before the Thought Police brand this ‘unpatriotic’? It’s “just the facts m’am, just the facts”.
    This what I pay my 12 cents a day for. Money well spent. Thanks ABC for continuing to tell it like it is.

  7. The ABC can only breach Operation Sovereign Borders if they manage to get boats full of asylum seekers past the Coast Guard and Navy.

    Nor is it secret. The government just isn’t putting out press releases, which seems to confuse the media who are lost without press releases and footage.

    The ABC is simply interviewing asylum seekers, which they are perfectly entitled to do and have done many times before. You may remember their interviews with Fasher that got them into trouble a few months ago when they were too lazy to either stick to claiming it was just what he said, or checking it if was true before saying it was.

    Fairfax and News have also interviewed many asylum seekers.

    What the ABC has is an exclusive deal for TV interviews, without a luxury Bali resort or Mike Willesee anywhere in sight.

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