Archival Rescue 49 ~ two years ago today

Back flash - Andrew Wilkie;

A lack of intelligence
May 31, 2003 Andrew Wilkie Sydney Morning Herald

Australia's spies knew the United States was lying about Iraq's WMD programme. So why didn't the Government choose to believe them? Andrew Wilkie writes.

'Intelligence" was how the Americans described the material accumulating on Iraq from their super-sophisticated spy systems. But to analysts at the Office of National Assessments in Canberra, a decent chunk of the growing pile looked like rubbish. In their offices on the top floor of the drab ASIO building, ONA experts found much of the US material worthy only of the delete button or the classified waste chute to the truck-sized shredder in the basement.

Australian spooks aren't much like the spies in the James Bond movies. Not many drink vodka martinis. But most are smart - certainly smart enough to understand how US intelligence on Iraq was badly skewed by political pressure, worst-case analysis and a stream of garbage-grade intelligence concocted by Iraqis desperate for US intervention in Iraq.

It wasn't just the Australians who were mystified by the accumulating US trash. The French, Germans and Russians had long before refused to be persuaded by Washington's line. British intelligence agencies were still inclined to take a more conservative position. And the chief weapons inspector, Hans Blix, even went so far as to say during a late April interview that "much of the intelligence on which the capitals built their case seemed to have been shaky".

So it was no surprise in some of the more mysterious corridors of Canberra last week when news broke about the CIA investigation into the US intelligence failure over Iraq. In fact, there was probably some relief, given the importance to Australian security of having the US intelligence system work properly.

After all, the Australia-US intelligence relationship is supposed to be one of the main reasons for the broader alliance between the two countries.

The CIA had clearly lost the plot if its October 2002 report on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program was anything to go by. Either that, or the agency was party to a disinformation campaign designed to encourage support for a war. How else to explain the excerpt quoted by the Prime Minister in early February: "All key aspects ... of Iraq's offensive biological weapons program are active and most elements are larger and more advanced than they were before the Gulf War."

The CIA's public acknowledgement of a review smells more like early positioning for its day of reckoning than a genuine interest in continuous improvement. The CIA can't afford another serious blunder so soon after its failure to pick up the September 11 attacks.

Condoleezza Rice was smart enough to attempt her U-turn weeks ago. According to the US National Security Adviser, WMD bombs, missiles and drones are out. Dual-use technology and just-in-time manufacturing are in. Find a pesticide factory, for instance, and you find a chemical warfare facility. And don't be concerned about looters. The more the place is trashed, the more difficult will be any dispute about the evidence. More recently, the US Secretary of Defence, Donald Rumsfeld, has said publicly that Iraq may have destroyed its WMDs prior to the war.

The Howard Government will not be keen for an inquiry into Australian assessments on Iraq. Much better to let the whiff of US intelligence failure drift across the Pacific in the hope it implies that Australia was the victim of advice beyond its control. The last thing the Government wants is too much scrutiny of its claims about Iraq's WMDs and links to al-Qaeda, or the fact these claims were in the main contrary to advice from the Government's intelligence community.

Some in the Australian intelligence community had latched onto the dodgy American intelligence, resulting in partial contamination of assessments with an overestimation of Iraq's WMD capability. But Australian intelligence agencies made it clear to the Government all along that Iraq did not have a massive WMD program (that dubious honour remains restricted to at least China, France, India, Iran, Israel, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, Syria, Britain and the US). Nor was Saddam Hussein co-operating actively with al-Qaeda. And there was no indication Iraq was intending to pass WMDs to terrorists.

There could not have been any doubt whatsoever about all this in the mind of the Prime Minister or of any member of the national security committee of cabinet. Report after report from the bureaucracy made it abundantly clear that the US impatience to go for Iraq had very little to do with WMDs and an awful lot to do with US strategic and domestic interests. John Howard's suggestion yesterday that the Government strong line on WMDs matched intelligence advice is contrary to the more moderate line contained in ONA reporting.

Yet Australia was happy to go along with George Bush. Shame it put thousands of Australian troops at risk, cost nearly a billion dollars and has increased the terrorist threat to Australia.

Howard's February statement on Iraq was like something out of a time warp - one Gulf war and 12 years of international sanctions and UN weapons inspections out of date. "Iraq has form. Saddam Hussein has without provocation invaded Iran and Kuwait. He has fired missiles at Saudi Arabia, Israel, Bahrain, and Qatar," he told Australians.

THE ONA was central in the lead-up to war. It understood months before it commenced that war was inevitable and Australia would be involved.

Despite Howard's protestations that no decision had yet been made, the ONA's people in Washington were frantically calling on their best contacts in the State Department and the CIA. Analysts in Canberra were preparing assessments almost daily; briefing teams were tramping back and forth to Parliament House constantly. Staff were gearing up to run a round-the-clock intelligence assessment function.

Now the WMD claims are unravelling. All that US intelligence garbage is on the nose. Coalition forces in Iraq have not found thousands of chemical artillery shells ready to be fired or ballistic missiles loaded with deadly bacteriological agents.

Moreover Rumsfeld's deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, has explained the WMD justification as a bureaucratic compromise, while a senior British spook has been reported as saying his country's public dossier on Iraq's WMD programme was manipulated by Downing Street to make a more compelling case for war

There is no big al-Qaeda apparatus - not even a box of plans for spiriting WMDs to terrorists. Only a broken country and a disgruntled people. Oh, and lots of oil.

That explains Howard's lurch towards his much-broader muddle of reasons for involvement in the war.

This is not to say that Iraq was of no concern or that some WMD-related materials will never be found in Iraq. Iraq had what's known in the business as a breakout WMD capability in its many dual-use facilities. The Fallujah III castor oil production plant near Baghdad, for example, was, like similar plants elsewhere in the world, suitable for conversion to a ricin toxin factory.

And Iraq, again like many countries including Australia, probably still has stockpiles of potential WMD ingredients - the chlorine needed for clean water, for example, can also be used to make deadly chemical agents.

Moreover, Iraq almost certainly had other WMD-related materials. US claims about mobile biological warfare facilities could yet prove true, though the implication that Iraq's biological weapons program relied on a handful of trailers tends to confirm the program was limited.

The trailers, and any other finds, will remain irrelevant until scrutinised by independent officials. The same goes for the interrogation reports of former Iraqi scientists, including those now detained in Morocco. With so much at stake, the possibility can't be ruled out that a zealous coalition official might attempt to tamper with the evidence.

Claims by Iraqis in custody that the WMD program was dismantled before the war could be true, especially if Saddam thought he could survive the war and achieve some sort of moral victory. But that would mean the program must have been much smaller than US assessments. Just as elusive is hard evidence of active co-operation with al-Qaeda. This was always an extraordinary proposition, not least because Saddam was a secular dictator intent on eradicating Islamic fundamentalism.

Another mystery is the Howard Government's enthusiasm for playing up the more general risk of WMD terrorism. It was well-advised, in briefing after briefing by ONA, that the risk of such an attack was - and still is - low, and that any such attack would almost certainly involve an unsophisticated device incapable of causing mass casualties. The chemical, biological or radiological device used was not likely to be a true WMD. The Government had also been advised of the many reasons countries do not pass WMDs to terrorists, not least the fear of massive US retaliation.

One of the major concerns about the war now is the way it will encourage the proliferation of WMDs. America's adversaries are being encouraged to acquire WMDs to deter US aggression. Mutually assured destruction kept the US and Soviet Union from each other's throats for decades. And, for now, Iran's and North Korea's arsenals seem to be influencing the US to back off.

Not that the US has any interest in multilateral arms control. The neo-cons in Washington think arms control doesn't work and is contrary to US interests.

Hence the US's lack of interest in the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban and Nuclear Non-Proliferation treaties. Washington's determination to develop new battlefield nuclear weapons is an especially alarming development.

"This is not going unnoticed and will come back to haunt us," says Richard Butler, the former head of the UN weapons inspection team in Iraq. "It's simply preposterous for the US to take the stand that it does on other people's WMD and ask the world to believe that its such weapons are of no such concern ..."

Another big concern is the dumbing-down and politicisation of Australia's intelligence. Most junior analysts try to offer frank and fearless advice. But the process is flawed. It involves so many layers of politically astute managers that the final result is often a report so bland as to be virtually worthless, or skewed ever so subtly towards the Government's preferred line. Better that, management would argue, than a brave report prepared in good faith that contradicts Government thinking or is likely to prove wrong over time.

Not that leaving the sharp edges on the intelligence reports would make much difference if a government chooses to believe only what it wants to believe and selects from the intelligence only what best suits its political purposes. The Federal Government pays much more attention to the mush of politicians' and advisers' views, public opinion and media commentary. And it applies a good dose of pro-US sycophancy. The result can be a fine compost indeed, as this whole Iraq business has proven.

Andrew Wilkie is a former analyst at the Office of National Assessments who resigned in protest at the Federal Government's actions over the Iraq war.

Archival Rescue 48 ~ Aus detention

Disturbing, released detainee speaks out about harsh treatment... and is promptly locked back up again.

Rau back in psychiatric care
May 27, 2005 - 12:23pm Sydney Morning Herald

Cornelia Rau has been returned to psychiatric care in Adelaide, just days after being released into the community.

After being wrongfully locked up in immigration detention last year, Ms Rau was released from the psychiatric ward at the Royal Adelaide Hospital on Monday on strict conditions that included taking medication daily.

However, her guardian - the Office of the Public Advocate - said today the former Qantas flight attendant had been returned to the Glenside Psychiatric Hospital on Wednesday night.

Spokeswoman Margaret Farr said the public advocate believed things had got "out of hand" in terms of what information had been reported in the press.

"We would ask if the media could respect her privacy," Ms Farr said.

"So what we are saying is just that she has been returned to hospital for further assessment."

Following her release, Ms Rau caused her carers some worry on Tuesday when she left her accommodation in the morning and did not return until late that night.

While she was essentially free to come and go as she pleased, her long absence raised concerns.

On Monday Ms Rau, whose wrongful immigration detention is now the subject of an official inquiry, said she would pursue financial compensation in the courts.

Ms Rau was wrongly identified as an illegal immigrant last year and held in a Queensland prison and then in the Baxter Immigration Detention Centre in South Australia for a total of 10 months.

Ms Rau said she had been "locked up in a cage like a caged animal".

Her lawyer, Claire O'Connor said Ms Rau was upset at being returned to Glenside and it was hoped another trial release could be arranged soon.

Archival Rescue 47 ~ Aus Detention

Over 88,000 detentions, 200 cases of "extra" wrongly detained detainees, and Howard is still trying to cover his eyes. One has the sense Australia's immigration and mandatory detention policy is collapsing in tatters, all a journalist need do is walk past, nudge a toe at the keeling edifice and another collumn comes tumbling down;

PM won't step up detainee enquiry
By Joseph Kerr and Louise Dodson
May 27, 2005 Sydney Morning Herald

The Federal Government yesterday ruled out a royal commission into hundreds of cases of people being detained when they were lawfully in Australia. This is despite reports that its appointed investigator has called for a judicial inquiry.

While Liberal MPs pushing for changes to the detention system have attracted support from the Anglican Church and the public, the Prime Minister, John Howard, has defended the Immigration Department, which is under investigation over more than 200 detention cases, and the Immigration Minister, Amanda Vanstone.

Mr Howard said more than 88,000 people had been detained by the Department of Immigration between July 2000 and April 2005, so the 201 cases under investigation represented only 0.2 per cent of the total.

A former Federal Police commissioner, Mick Palmer, is heading an investigation into the cases after he was appointed in February to review the wrongful incarceration of German-born Australian resident Cornelia Rau, but it is unclear if he will see out the full investigation.

In Parliament yesterday, Mr Howard said he did "not intend to relieve Senator Vanstone of her responsibilities" but he suggested improvements could be made to the detention system after Mr Palmer had submitted his recommendations.

Senator Vanstone has refused to respond to reports that Mr Palmer has told her he will no longer head the inquiry after submitting his report on Ms Rau in about three weeks' time, or that he has called for a judicial investigation into the other cases.

Until the end of June, the other senior officer with the inquiry, former Victorian chief police commissioner Neil Comrie, will be in charge of the investigation into deported Australian woman, Vivian Alvarez Solon, and the other detention cases.

According to documents obtained by the Herald, Mr Palmer has two contracts with the Immigration Department, one worth $291,500 and the other $150,000. Mr Comrie also has two contracts, one worth $220,000 and the other $110,000.

A Senate committee heard last night that Mr Palmer and Mr Comrie are involved in a security company named Global Village Survival. It is not known if it has had contracts with the organisations the two men are investigating.

The secretary of the Immigration Department, Bill Farmer, told the Senate estimates hearing yesterday that the department was "preparing for what may well be an extension of those contracts" but he could not say how far they need to be extended.

A department spokesman said the total cost of the Palmer inquiry so far was $460,622. Mr Palmer had been paid $112,500; Mr Comrie $59,091 and other contractors have been paid $160,677.

Meanwhile, the bishops of the Anglican diocese of Melbourne, including Archbishop Peter Watson, yesterday supported the private member's bills, proposed by Liberal MP Petro Georgiou and backed by Bruce Baird and Judi Moylan, aimed at limiting long-term detention.

In an open letter, the bishops supported the bills as an opportunity to review Australia's "inhumane immigration and detention policies".

"It is greatly encouraging that some Coalition parliamentarians are now giving voice to these ethical concerns," they said.

Archival Rescue 46 ~ Aus Detention

200 wrongfully detained, 928 more detainees to check.

Scandal explodes to 200 detainees
By Joseph Kerr, Louise Dodson and Lee Glendinning May 26, 2005 Sydney Morning Herald

The inquiry into the immigration fiasco has grown exponentially to cover more than 200 people in detention despite being lawfully in Australia, as confusion deepens in the Government over its mandatory detention system.

The head of the inquiry, the former federal police commissioner Mick Palmer, will not take on the extra load - and instead will recommend his investigation be handed over to a judicial power such as the Commonwealth Ombudsman, the ABC's Lateline reported last night.

But the cases referred to the inquiry could run even higher, as officials admit they are yet to check thoroughly the status of all 928 detainees.

Turmoil in the Government grew yesterday as the Prime Minister, John Howard, contradicted his Immigration Minister, Amanda Vanstone, by saying a child born in Perth would not return to detention on Christmas Island with his mother and father.

And there is tension among Labor MPs, after the Opposition Leader, Kim Beazley, denied them a conscience vote on two private member's bills to be put forward by the Liberal MP Petro Georgiou to release long-term detainees. Mr Howard had already ruled out a free vote for his MPs.

Mr Beazley staunchly supported mandatory detention yesterday, which he said Labor "invented", but he said its operation should be humane.

Appearing with senior immigration officials before a Senate estimates committee, Senator Vanstone announced the second wave of changes to immigration procedures in three months and revealed her department had referred a total of 201 cases to the Palmer inquiry. But Lateline said Mr Palmer would walk away. And Senator Vanstone, interviewed on the program, would not comment on whether he had recommended a wider inquiry.

The program said he believed a more open inquiry - with judicial powers to compel and protect witnesses - was needed. It said he would report only the original case he was asked to investigate: that of German-born Australian resident Cornelia Rau, who was held in Baxter detention centre for four months despite warnings she may have been schizophrenic.

But it has grown to include the wrongful deportation of Vivian Alvarez Solon to the Philippines - and a further 199 cases of detainees found to be lawfully in Australia.

Senator Vanstone said these included people detained for a "very short period of time whilst their identity and legal status is determined" and others who became legal while in detention, such as children made citizens automatically upon turning 10 if born here.

The detention changes announced by the minister include increasing the frequency of visits by psychiatrists to Baxter, from once every six weeks to once every fortnight; placing two new psychiatric nurses at the centre; better measures to identify people in detention; and making her department more open to complaints.

The Government is facing an unprecedented rebellion from its ranks, with six Liberal MPs backing the Georgiou bills.

Archival Rescue 45 ~ Outsourced torture

Tortured suspect had ASIO checks
By Marian Wilkinson National Security Editor May 26, 2005 Sydney Morning Herald

An Australian citizen who claimed in a Kuwaiti court his fingernails were ripped out under torture by Kuwaiti police was investigated more than a year ago by ASIO in Sydney, according to his brother.

Tllaal Adrey appeared in a Kuwaiti court for the first time since his arrest by Kuwaiti State Security in February and asked to see officials from the Australian embassy in Kuwait.

"They pulled out my fingernails at State Security," Adrey told the court before he was charged as part of a terrorist group, the Lions of the Peninsula, which allegedly planned the deaths of several Kuwaiti security officials. Details of the specific charge against Adrey were pending last night.

The Australian Government has repeatedly said it attempted to gain access to Adrey more than 16 times since his arrest. But his brother, Fahed al-Saad, speaking through a family friend told the Herald the Australian Government knew a lot more about the case and revealed that ASIO had first questioned him about his brother almost two years ago, after Adrey returned to Kuwait.

According to Mr Saad's account, ASIO took an interest in him and his brother when a member of their Bidoon community in south-west Sydney established a radical website. The Bidoons are a minority in Kuwait deemed stateless by the Kuwaiti government.

A group of Bidoons were granted refugee status in Australia after the first Gulf War, including Adrey and his brother.

Mr Saad believes ASIO questioned other Bidoons about his brother in the past few months, according to their spokesman and friend, Ali Hamdy.

Yesterday, the Attorney-General, Philip Ruddock, declined to confirm or deny any investigation by ASIO. However, when asked whether any information from ASIO was passed to the Kuwaiti authorities on Adrey, his office said Mr Ruddock wanted to make it clear the Australian Government did not condone torture for any reason and that "we would not be putting Australian citizens in a position where that activity is likely to be carried out".

Mr Ruddock's office also said ASIO had no contact with Adrey. No Australian official attended Adrey's court hearing on Tuesday despite being given notice of his appearance.

But Bruce Billson, parliamentary secretary for the Foreign Affairs minister, said the Australian consul in Kuwait had been assured by Kuwaiti authorities that Adrey was "in excellent health" and had seen medical reports by prison officials.

Mr Billson said an Australian embassy official did attempt to attend the court but was unable to obtain entry. Officials will meet Adrey on Saturday. Mr Billson also said Kuwaiti Justice Ministry officials had told the acting ambassador that the case "would be a bit of a circus".

Twenty-one other men and a woman charged in the case pleaded not guilty. Adrey has repeatedly protested his innocence of the terrorism charge. All the suspects reportedly told the court they confessed under duress and four took off their shirts in the dock to show scars on their backs they claimed were the result of torture.

Islamic Friendship Association of Australia president Keysar Trad released a copy of a letter from Adrey to the Australian Mufti, Sheik Taj el-Din al Hilaly, asking for help.

The sheik is negotiating on behalf of Douglas Wood who is being held captive in Iraq.

Archival Rescue 44 ~ Aus Detention

No room at the inn, child born into detention;

Uncertain future for newborn detainee
By Andra Jackson May 26, 2005 Sydney Morning Herald

Like any new mother, Hoai Thu Nguyen proudly keeps her newborn son by her side in bed but she can't stop crying at the thought that he could grow up in detention.

Michael Andrew Tran, born on Monday night in a Perth hospital to asylum seekers detained for two years on Christmas Island, is Australia's newest detainee.

His birth, as his mother was under 24-hour guard, has fuelled controversy about the impact of keeping children in detention.

The two-day-old baby yesterday became the centre of a tug-of-war over his future with the Prime Minister, John Howard, saying the baby would not be forced to live in detention on Christmas Island and the Immigration Minister, Amanda Vanstone, saying he would.

Senator Vanstone later confirmed the baby and his parents would return to their present temporary community accommodation in Perth.

Refugee advocate Kaye Bernard, the only outside person allowed to visit Ms Nguyen, said this was still detention as the there were two guards at the house, and the couple were not allowed to go outside or to have visitors.

Speaking from her hospital bed, Ms Nguyen said: "I feel sad and sorry that he [the baby] will have to go into detention with me.

"I feel detention is very strange in itself," she said.

"I'm anxious all the time and it makes me feel abnormal."

Ms Nguyen, who had a difficult birth, said having two guards by her hospital room 24 hours a day made her feel uncomfortable, especially during the birth.

Detention guards made her go back to detention in Perth twice after being taken to hospital with contractions in the 48 hours before giving birth, she said.

"It was frustrating having to go back and forth," the first-time mother said.

Ms Nguyen and her husband were among 53 Vietnamese asylum seekers intercepted off Port Hedland on July 1, 2003 and were taken to Christmas Island.

"I don't know why my family and the other asylum seekers have been treated so badly by the Australian Government," she said.

Archival Rescue 43 ~ Aus Detention

Beazley sells out, his popularity rating will suffer.

Beazley rules out conscience vote on detention bill
By Louise Dodson Chief Political Correspondent
May 26, 2005 Sydney Morning Herald

Federal Labor MPs have been denied a conscience vote by their leader, Kim Beazley, on legislation aimed at releasing asylum seekers from long-term detention.

Mr Beazley's decision followed the refusal of the Prime Minister, John Howard, on Tuesday to allow Government MPs a conscience vote on private member's bills to be introduced by Liberal MP Petro Georgiou.

Although Mr Beazley yesterday asked Mr Howard whether he would allow a conscience vote within Government ranks, in regard to the ALP's position he said later: "We will take a collective Labor Party attitude to it."

Mr Beazley also strongly supported mandatory detention.

"We have very firm, clear-cut views on this," he said, "because we invented it - the need for mandatory detention as a deterrent. We put it in place when we were in office."

But he said the detention system had to be operated in a competent and humane fashion.

Labor also reserved the right to move amendments to Mr Georgiou's legislation, he said.

Mr Georgiou's bills aim to release women and children as well as asylum seekers who have been detained longer than 12 months (after health and security checks), and grant permanent residence to those on temporary protection visas.

It has the backing of at least four Liberals - Judi Moylan, Bruce Baird, Russell Broadbent and Marise Payne.

Liberal parliamentarians yesterday expressed concerns about the operation of the detention system, especially its management by the Department of Immigration, Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs.

Some MPs, who did not want to be named, said that while they disagreed with the viewpoint of Mr Georgiou, Mr Baird and Ms Moylan, they nonetheless admired their conviction.

The Immigration Department could be headed for a major shake-up after the Palmer inquiry has reported, senior Government sources said.

At the same time most MPs and ministers supported Mr Howard's insistence that the current policy remain.

The Deputy Prime Minister, John Anderson, and the Industrial Relations Minister, Kevin Andrews, said the policy should not be changed.

Andrew Robb, a former Liberal Party federal director, said detention was a difficult area but concessions had already been made to soften the system.

"There has been a serious attempt to be more lenient without compromising the basics of the program," he said. "The basic principles of the program should not be compromised."

Compulsory detention sent a strong message all around the world that people could not jump queues, Mr Robb said.

Another Liberal MP, Wilson Tuckey, said: "The minute you open loopholes, the boats will start coming again."

The Uniting Church yesterday called on Coalition MPs - especially those who had visited detention centres - to support Mr Georgiou's proposals.

The church's president, Reverend Dean Drayton, said: "The proposed changes to the mandatory detention regime recognise that the current policy is unsustainable and damaging to people's wellbeing as well as being contrary to our international human rights obligations."

Mr Georgiou's move also won support from the Law Council of Australia. Its president, John North, said: "Since the exposure of what has happened to Peter Qasim, Cornelia Rau, Vivian Alvarez Solon, Naomi Leong and their families, the Australian public is gradually getting to see the failure of our mandatory detention system."

The Liberal Party will debate the private member's bills on Tuesday next week, with the proposed legislation expected to be introduced into Parliament by Mr Georgiou next month.

Archival Rescue 42 ~ Aus "workplace reforms"

Andrews "waters down" watering down speech;

Workplace reforms set to be launched
May 26, 2005 - 8:59AM Sydney Morning Herald

The federal government's proposed industrial reforms were not about destroying the power of unions, Workplace Relations Minister Kevin Andrews said today.

Prime Minister John Howard will today announce details of the government's long awaited workplace reforms, which it will be able to pass after it takes control of the Senate in July.

The reforms are expected to include changes to the way in which minimum wages are set, a watering down of award employment conditions, limits to some of the industrial umpire's powers and an expansion of the exemption from unfair dismissal laws to businesses with up to 100 workers.

Before unveiling the package to the coalition party room, Mr Andrews told reporters that unions had nothing to fear from the package.

"You will see from this package that the place of the unions in Australia will continue to exist within this country," Mr Andrews told reporters.

"This is not a package about setting out to destroy unions or anything like that.

"What we are trying to do is to ensure that we get the flexibility in the system that will ensure that more Australians are able to get jobs and able to earn higher wages."

Mr Andrews said that while he would not go into detail until later today, there would be reform to unfair dismissal laws.

"We have been concerned about unfair dismissals," he said.

"Everywhere I go around Australia I am told stories of unmeritorious claims that cost thousands of dollars for small business.

"It's a running sore for small business in Australia and one which we have been concerned about for many years."

There would also be "evolutionary changes" to the industrial relations commission, he said.

A key section of the package would rely on the support of the premiers at next week's Council of Australian Governments meeting.

"We've said that our preference would be for the premiers of the states, other than Victoria who have already handed over their powers to the Commonwealth, (to) ... refer their powers as well," he said.

"But if the premiers won't do that then we believe that the current system is costly, it's confusing, it's complex and it is time for a national system and we will use the corporations power if the premiers are not prepared to act sensibly and refer their powers."

Asked whether he believed the reforms would be Mr Howard's crowning glory, he said: "I hope it's my crowning glory."

AAP

Archival Rescue 41 ~ Aus detention

Wrongfully detained - 201 cases to be investigated (nine detention centres still to close).

Wrongful detention: 200 cases go to enquiry
May 25, 2005 - 11:53am AAP Sydney Morning Herald

More than 200 cases of possible wrongful immigration detention have been uncovered since the Cornelia Rau affair, Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone says.

Senator Vanstone's admission follows weeks of pressure over the wrongful detention of Ms Rau and the deportation to the Philippines of Australian citizen Vivian Alvarez Solon.

Several Liberal backbenchers have mounted a rebellion against the Government's mandatory immigration detention policies, planning to introduce their own legislation to water down the laws.

But Senator Vanstone defended her department, saying it was often difficult to correctly identify someone suspected of having a mental illness.

She said she had made several changes in light of the cases and was considering bringing in experts to fix problems.

"I recognise that it may be appropriate to involve external expertise," she told a Senate estimates hearing.

Senator Vanstone said that, while 201 cases marked "released not unlawful", had been referred to former Australian Federal Police chief Mick Palmer for investigation, not every one would turn out to be a case of wrongful detention.

"Every single case will be looked at separately, every one of them, because the department is determined to recognise what problems it may have and to change," she said.

"And I am not going to ... engage in that work and then have further problems arise later. It must start with a clean slate.

"But even more importantly than that, if there are any cases in that number that have a problem, then [they] have to be dealt with as a right for the person involved.

"We've done the search, we've gone back as far as these records are held and we're referring just over 200 cases."

Senator Vanstone said she had asked her department to look at using biometrics to identify people, and had set up a special national identification unit in the Canberra head office to ensure complex cases were dealt with quickly and consistently.

The unit will help state and territory case officers check identities, while immigration detention review managers will be in place by the end of May in each state and territory where people are detained.

From May 28, a psychiatrist will visit Baxter detention centre every fortnight and, from next week, psychiatric nurses will be on call 24 hours a day.

The changes are not enough to placate moderate Liberal backbenchers, who want children and their parents released from immigration detention immediately, and all detainees released after a year.

Victorian MP Petro Georgiou has drawn up his own legislation. Up to four Government MPs are believed to support his move.

Prime Minister John Howard has ruled out a conscience vote on the issue, angering former Liberal candidate and human rights advocate Greg Barns, who was disendorsed for publicly opposing the Government's treatment of asylum seekers.

"Mr Howard allowed a conscience vote on right-to-die legislation, IVF and abortion - there is no difference between those matters of conscience and the rights of human beings in detention when they have committed no crime," Mr Barns said.

Archival Rescue 40 ~ Aus detention

Howard spits dummy, backbenchers grow spine;

Howard explodes at MP's revolt
By Louise Dodson Chief Political Correspondent May 25, 2005 Sydney Morning Herald

The Prime Minister, John Howard, has reacted furiously to a backbench move to overturn the Government's detention policy and push a vote on the release of all long-term detainees.

Three Liberal MPs gave notice in the party room yesterday that they would introduce two private member's bills that would soften mandatory detention for asylum seekers.

The move by Petro Georgiou, Bruce Baird and Judi Moylan attracted the public support of another MP, Russell Broadbent, and caught Mr Howard visibly off guard.

He forcefully told MPs that the Government owed its political success to the policy and that he would not be changing it or allow a conscience vote. Those at the party meeting described his mood as "very, very angry". He insisted Mr Georgiou defer his bills until next Tuesday when the party could hold a full-scale debate.

This has unleashed a torrent of campaigning from both sides. Ms Moylan said she thought more Liberal MPs would support the softer approach to detention.

The split follows several bungles by the Immigration Department and comes at a time when the party is already divided over leadership. At this stage, Peter Costello's supporters say detention is a separate issue because the Treasurer's position is the same as Mr Howard's. The detention debate will also put pressure on the Labor Party to support Mr Georgiou's bills.

Mr Howard thought he had headed off the dissent on the treatment of detainees when Cabinet agreed in March to release a limited number of asylum seekers under a new visa category.

However, Mr Georgiou, Mr Baird and Ms Moylan continued to work secretly on their legislation and Mr Howard's office was given notice of it on Monday.

Since 1996, several private member's bills have been introduced but only on issues where the Prime Minister has allowed a conscience vote, such as on euthanasia.

Mr Georgiou's bills would allow, after health and security checks, the release of asylum seekers detained for longer than 12 months. They would give those on temporary protection visas permanent residency and release women and children from detention.

They would also overturn the Immigration Department's strong powers in determining detention policy by giving an independent judicial assessor the power of review. This position determining detention policy by giving an independent judicial assessor the power of review. This position would be filled by a judge or retired judge.

The bills, according to Mr Georgiou's outline, would replace "the system of universal mandatory detention of unauthorised asylum seekers with a targeted system of detention subject to judicial scrutiny". They would also "end the system of providing only temporary protection visas to some people who have been found to be refugees".

Ms Moylan spoke passionately in the party room on the need for the change, saying the treatment of asylum seekers was a test of Australia's democracy.

"As a party and a government we have always stood for a fair go and a vigorous democracy based on the rule of law and justice for everyone," she told the Herald after the meeting. "We have fought in two world wars … to preserve democracy and the rule of law.The policy of detaining people without charge does not uphold that principle. We lock up people who are fleeing regimes which we have fought against."

The bills were a sensible solution and would provide transparency and greater account-ability, Ms Moylan said. The Immigration Department had the power to detain people without charge, greater powers than any other body.

MPs in favour of the bills argue that community attitudes to detention have changed following the public outcry over the detention of Cornelia Rau and the deportation of Vivian Alvarez to the Philippines.

The Government has offered to compensate Ms Alvarez and pay some of her medical and counselling costs on her return to Australia. Ms Rau also wants compensation from the Government.

Archival Rescue 39 ~ Aus detention

Dispelling detention's bogeymen in real wild world;

Freedom frightens little Naomi
By Lee Glendinning May 25, 2005 Sydney Morning Herald

Once outside the confines of Villawood Detention Centre Naomi Leong, 3, cried for much of the night.

Everything about her release from detention into the outside world was so disorienting. She was distressed by the sight of so many cars, confused by the trees.

She woke after a shallow sleep and whispered to her mother, Virginia, that she had dreamt of puppy dogs.

Soon running around outside and eating barbecue chips, Naomi appeared vivacious, but would often retreat, hiding behind huge terracotta pots while Ms Leong waited for their visa forms to be processed.

In the late afternoon at Parramatta Park she was mostly uninterested in the other children who wanted to play with her, preferring to sit alone in the rose garden.

Advocates for immigration detainees and those who have observed Naomi say her behaviour tends to mirror her mother's.

When Virginia Leong became distressed inside detention, Naomi would bang her head against the wall, and exist in an almost trance-like state, often lying alone in a room for hours.

With her mother clearly still in shock yesterday, psychiatrists said the pair would be haunted by their time in detention and would suffer continuing problems.

Dr Louise Newman, who assessed Naomi in detention at Villawood, said it was likely she could suffer post-traumatic stress and would need long-term support to recover. "The sad and tragic thing of this case, I think, is this child has already suffered."

Dr Michael Dudley, a psychiatrist who has examined Naomi and her mother, said their future well-being would be dependent on permanent residency. "They're still non-citizens, so they can't get on with their lives, and that is a major problem … so they continue to have high levels of insecurity and fear."

Virginia Leong had been inside Villawood since 2001, when she had been caught trying to leave Australia with a false passport. At the time she was two months' pregnant, and because Naomi was born in detention the child has been deemed stateless.

The pair were granted bridging visas on Monday and are now staying with a friend and former detainee in Parramatta.

Yesterday Ms Leong's visa was upgraded so she can work and obtain Medicare benefits. However, Naomi remains on a visa without access to Medicare.

Ms Leong's lawyer, Michaela Byers, believes they have a strong chance of staying in Australia.

Ms Leong hopes she can carve out a future here, and have access to the seven-year-old son she has not seen for four years.

"Being outside is a dream come true … I just want to be healthy, and happy," she said.

"I feel good. Actually, I feel fantastic. Freedom, you know, it's mine."

Archival Rescue 38 ~ Outsourced torture

Torturers had Australian accents;

'They pulled out my fingernails'
May 25, 2005 - 5:05pm AAP Sydney Morning Herald

An Australian facing the death penalty after being charged with being a member of a terror group has told a Kuwaiti court his fingernails were pulled out by state security officers.

Sydney businessman Tllaal Adrey has proclaimed his innocence after being charged with being a member of the Peninsula Lions terrorist group.

The group, believed to be linked to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network, was allegedly involved in four shoot-outs in Kuwait in January in which nine Islamists and four security personnel were killed.

It is also suspected of links to militants in neighbouring Iraq and Saudi Arabia.

Prosecutors have demanded the death penalty for Adrey and 20 others who also appeared in court.

Adrey told the Kuwait City criminal court he was innocent.

He also claimed he was tortured after his arrest.

"They pulled out my fingernails at state security," he told the court.

Adrey's mother and brother told ABC television through an interpreter last week that Adrey believed two of his torturers had Australian accents, but the government has rejected the claim.

Adrey has also declared his innocence in a letter written to Australia's Islamic leader, it emerged today.

Islamic Friendship Association of Australia president Keysar Trad said he had received a fax of the letter from Adrey, written in Arabic to his mother, on Monday.

Adrey, who moved to Kuwait three years ago with his wife and five children, all Australian citizens, asks for help from the Mufti of Australia, Sheikh Taj Aldin Alhilali.

Adrey said "government agents" came to his Kuwaiti home and took him away.

"(They) took me away from my children and wife without mercy or humanity, covered my eyes whilst my wife and children remained behind in tears," said the letter, translated by Mr Trad.

"They took me and imprisoned me, then they beat me and tortured me and detained me in segregation."

Adrey, who moved to Australia in 1997 and became a citizen, said he did not know why he had been imprisoned, and had received no help from Australia.

"It is most unfortunate that Australia and the Australian Embassy have ignored my plight and have not intervened," the letter read.

"I have not been visited by any Australian officials."

Mr Trad said he had passed the letter onto the federal government and hoped it would act soon.

"It's really atrocious that an Australian citizen can be treated this way," he said.

The Australian Department of Foreign Affairs said an Australian diplomat would meet with Adrey in jail on Saturday.

Six of Adrey's co-accused also told the court in Kuwait they had confessed under duress, with four taking their shirts off to display scars on their backs they said were inflicted by state security investigators.

Others on trial included Jordanians, Saudis, a Somali, Kuwaitis and stateless Arabs who have lived in Kuwait without becoming citizens.

The men who appeared in court today wore prison uniforms, with heads shaven and long unkempt beards marking them as extremist Muslims.

Eleven of the 37 suspects charged in the case are still at large. The defendants were shackled and guarded by masked and armed special forces.

The hearing was adjourned until June 11 to allow lawyers to read the 4,000-page documents in the case.

Police reportedly found chemicals and bomb-making instructions in one of the group's safe houses near the Saudi border earlier this year.

Under Kuwaiti law, it is normal procedure for a charge to be laid against the group in the first instance before a judge hears individual cases.

Archival Rescue 37 ~ Aus detention

Three year old's first day out of detention;

Freed from a life in detention
By Lee Glendinning and Joseph Kerr May 24, 2005 Sydney Morning Herald

Naomi Leong, the three-year-old girl who has spent her life in detention, left Villawood with her mother last night after the Government gave them a bridging visa to stay in Australia.

The decision to release Virginia Leong and her daughter from the detention centre was unexpected but supporters believe the Government bowed to pressure over the mental health of detainees.

Ms Leong, who had complained that detention was causing Naomi to bang her head against the wall, was overjoyed last night. "I am so happy now, I am so happy, I can't believe it, I am just out here, out of detention - outside!" she said.

"I thought it was a trick when they gave me the forms."

Earlier inside the centre she said: "Naomi doesn't understand what is happening but I have just told her we are going to see a friend and she is excited."

The office of the Immigration Minister, Amanda Vanstone, said it was not her decision to free them but her department's.

A department spokeswoman said the decision followed discussions between Ms Leong, her lawyer and the department. She refused to say why they were being released.

As mother and daughter left the detention centre to spend the night at a friend's home in Parramatta, supporters presented Naomi with a pink bicycle, which she rode around in circles on the pavement. Ms Leong carried virtually no possessions, saying she had left them with other detainees.

Ms Leong, who was detained by immigration authorities in 2001 when she tried to leave Australia on a false passport, was confused when Villawood officials presented her with paperwork yesterday afternoon. She called her solicitor and it was only when he arrived that they discovered the forms would allow her and Naomi to leave.

Ms Leong, who is from Malaysia, said she planned to make her life in Australia, where she has a seven-year-old son, Griffin, from an earlier relationship. She has not seen him in more than three years. "I cannot believe I can see my son very soon," she said.

Her lawyer, Michaela Byers, said the decision was a surprise but she thought pressure from the media had contributed. "There are a number of inquiries right now about the mental health issues being suffered by detainees, particularly with children, and there has also been pressure from national and international media on this issue which I think has contributed," she said.

Numerous psychiatric reports have shown that Ms Leong is suffering from severe depression and that Naomi has become mute, listless and unresponsive.

Naomi started banging her head against a wall and was unable to talk to other children. She was traumatised at seeing how upset her mother was, which forced Ms Leong into hiding her distress, adding to her own depression.

Of the 62 children in detention in Australia, none have been held as long as Naomi.

Last week the Immigration Department allowed her to attend an early learning centre for three hours. It was the first time she had played with children on the outside.

Even though Ms Leong is a Malaysian her daughter is considered stateless. This weekend Malaysia urged Ms Leong to apply for Malaysian citizenship for Naomi. Ms Leong refused the offer, which was reported in Malaysian newspapers, because it would mean she could never see her son.

The Government has recently softened its immigration policy following intense pressure over bungles in its detention system, including those concerning Cornelia Rau and Vivian Alvarez.

Last week, a group of about 50 East Timorese who were to be expelled from Australia won a surprise reprieve after Senator Vanstone agreed to reconsider their case.

A new visa class has been created for those long-term detainees whose applications to stay in Australia have failed but who cannot be sent back to their countries of origin for various reasons. Senator Vanstone has also signalled further changes to the Migration Act to increase the degree of flexibility available to her officers in handling cases.

The bridging visa Ms Leong has been given does not allow her to work. Her lawyer will apply to the Immigration Department this morning for a bridging visa that will allow her to work and give her access to Medicare.

Archival Rescue 36 ~ Aus Detention

Cornelia Rau speaks to the media;

Rau seeks compensation, but detention still a mystery
By Penelope Debelle May 24, 2005 Sydney Morning Herald

Speaking with a slight German accent Cornelia Rau, discharged yesterday from a South Australian psychiatric hospital into supported accommodation in Adelaide, declared herself a German woman wrongly detained by immigration authorities after she lost her passport and had her money stolen.

"I am from Hamburg, Germany, and I have never been treated so unfairly all my life," said Ms Rau, who spoke briefly in German at a press conference organised by her lawyer, refugee advocate Claire O'Connor. "I am a German citizen and a permanent Australian resident."

Looking healthy and suntanned, Ms Rau, 39, who came to Australia from Hamburg as an 18-month-old baby and lived in Sydney before she was wrongly detained, said she would seek compensation from the Federal Government for the gruelling 11 months during which she had feared for her life.

During a 25-minute press conference, Ms Rau spoke at length on subjects of interest to her, but she filled in only some of the gaps in the story of how an Australian woman, a former Qantas flight attendant with family in Sydney, was locked up by police in North Queensland in March 2004, after discharging herself from Manly Hospital in Sydney.

She said she was picked up in Queensland after her diary, money and passport were stolen - and had been treated badly.

"I was kept in a small cell," she said. "It was a very tormenting experience."

Dressed in dark clothes and sneakers with her hair in small plaits, Ms Rau said she feared for her life in Queensland when guards gave her an injection. She had been unable to contact a lawyer or human rights groups and could not access a phone, she said.

"I don't think [Immigration Minister] Amanda Vanstone would have liked to be in my situation," she said.

She said she had told guards in Queensland she was Cornelia Rau and yesterday declined to answer why she used other names while detained, including Anna Schmidt and Anna Brotmeyer.

"I have my reasons," she said.

After moving in October last year from immigration detention in the Queensland prison system to the Baxter detention centre at Port Augusta she was put behind barbed wire, she said.

"I was locked up like a caged animal," she said, calling for the centres to be closed down. "That's what happens to some immigrants from countries like Iran, Iraq and Asia, not to Caucasians."

She complained of rough behaviour in the high-security Red One compound at Baxter where Ms Rau said a guard cornered her and threw her onto the grass.

"I had to put my hand behind my back, then another four guards came running up as well, it was quite foul," she said.

Ms Rau, whose behaviour at Baxter provoked concern from other detainees, spoke with equal outrage over her detention in the Glenside mental health unit at the Royal Adelaide Hospital.

"I've been held there and not had freedom to move around and experience life," she said of the past four months after her family identified her in detention. "I don't have any illness. I am very healthy and value every day."

Describing herself as down to earth and straightforward, she said she had been diagnosed with schizophrenia but denied suffering from it or any other mental illness.

"I don't hear voices or have any symptoms of illness," she said. "I am just an outspoken German person who has done nothing wrong. I am in this predicament and it is not fair for me."

Ms Rau said the media had wrongly reported her situation but the confusion would clear up now she was speaking out.

During the press conference, called to update the media on her release then ask for privacy, Ms Rau spoke of her support for the Greens and Bob Brown, her outrage at Macquarie Bank executives receiving millions a year while villagers in Africa needed anti-AIDS medication, a greater domestic role for the Australian army and conversations in Qantas first-class with a fellow German, formula one racing car driver Michael Schumacher.

Archival Rescue 35 ~ Torture and Detention

UN condemns Afghan abuse report
May 22, 2005 - 8:05pm Reuters Sydney Morning Herald

report of US military abuse of detainees in Afghanistan is deeply disturbing and those involved should be punished, the United Nations said on Sunday.

The abuse, including details of the deaths of two inmates at an Afghan detention centre, took place in 2002 and emerged from a nearly 2000-page file of US Army investigators, The New York Times said on Friday.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai, speaking before leaving on a US trip, said on Saturday he was shocked and was demanding action against the culprits as well as custody of Afghan prisoners and supervision of US military searches.

Jean Arnault, special representative of the UN secretary-general in Afghanistan, said the abuse reported in the New York Times was unacceptable and an affront to everything the international community stood for.

"The gravity of these abuses calls for the punishment of all those involved in such inexcusable crimes, as demanded by President Karzai," Arnault said in a statement.

Arnault said steps taken since 2002 to eradicate mistreatment and improve conditions should be made public. Complaints that continue to be made of arbitrary arrest and detention without charge should be fully addressed, he said.

The United States commands a foreign force in Afghanistan of about 18,300, most of them American, fighting Taliban insurgents and hunting militant leaders, including Osama bin Laden.

The United States is holding more than 500 prisoners from its war on terrorism at the Guantanamo Bay naval base on Cuba. Many of them were detained in Afghanistan after the Taliban overthrow in late 2001.

US forces are also believed to be holding several hundred Afghans in Afghanistan.

The New York Times said the US army report centres on the death of a 22-year-old taxi driver known only as Dilawar and that of another detainee, Habibullah, who died at the US base at Bagram, north of Kabul, in December 2002.

According to the report, Dilawar was chained by his wrists to the top of his cell for several days before he died and his legs had been pummelled by guards.

"The file depicts young, poorly trained soldiers in repeated incidents of abuse. The harsh treatment, which has resulted in criminal charges against seven soldiers, went well beyond the two deaths," the newspaper said.

In sworn statements to army investigators, soldiers described mistreatment ranging from a female interrogator stepping on a detainee's neck and kicking another in the genitals to a shackled prisoner being made to kiss the boots of interrogators, according to the newspaper.

US officials have characterised incidents of prisoner abuse at Bagram in 2002 as isolated problems that were thoroughly investigated, the newspaper said.

Two army interrogators have been reprimanded and seven soldiers have been charged, it said.

Archival Rescue 34 ~ Torture Afghanistan

American torturers driven by boredom
By Tim Golden May 21, 2005 Sydney Morning Herald

Like a narrative counterpart to the digital images from Abu Ghraib, a confidential US Army report contains graphic details of widespread abuse of detainees in Afghanistan in 2002 carried out by young and poorly trained soldiers.

The abuse, described along with the details of the deaths of two inmates at the Bagram detention centre, emerged from a nearly 2000-page file of the army's criminal investigation into the case.

The report centres on the death of a 22-year-old taxi driver known only as Dilawar and that of another detainee, Habibullah, who died at Bagram six days earlier in December 2002. But the harsh treatment went well beyond the two deaths.

In some instances, it was directed or carried out by interrogators to extract information. In others, it was punishment meted out by military police guards.

Sometimes the torment seems to have been driven by little more than boredom or cruelty, or both.

In statements to US army investigators, soldiers described one female interrogator with a taste for humiliation stepping on the neck of one prostrate detainee and kicking another in the genitals.

They tell of a shackled prisoner being forced to roll back and forth on the floor of a cell, kissing the boots of his two interrogators as he went. Yet another prisoner is made to pick plastic bottle caps out of a drum mixed with excrement and water as part of a strategy to soften him up for questioning.

Incidents of prisoner abuse at Bagram have previously been reported, but US officials have characterised them as isolated problems that were thoroughly investigated.

Yet the Bagram file includes ample testimony that harsh treatment by some interrogators was routine and that guards could strike shackled detainees with virtual impunity.

According to the report, Dilawar, a taxi driver, had been hauled from his cell around 2 am to answer questions about a rocket attack on a US base.

When he arrived in the interrogation room, his legs were bouncing uncontrollably and his hands were numb.

He had been chained by his wrists to the ceiling of his cell for much of the previous four days.

Dilawar asked for a drink of water, and one of the two interrogators, Specialist Joshua Claus, 21, picked up a large plastic bottle. But first he punched a hole in the bottom, the interpreter said, so as the prisoner fumbled weakly with the cap, the water poured out over his orange prison scrubs. The soldier then grabbed the bottle back and began squirting the water forcefully into Dilawar's face.

A military police guard tried to force the young man to his knees. But his legs, which had been pummelled by US military guards for several days, could no longer bend.

When he was finally sent back to his cell, though, the guards were instructed to chain the prisoner back to the ceiling.

Several hours passed before an emergency room doctor saw Dilawar. By then he was dead, his body beginning to stiffen. It would be many months before army investigators learned a final horrific detail - most of the interrogators believed Dilawar was an innocent man who simply drove his taxi past the US base at the wrong time.

ABUSE WAS TAPED

• Abu Ghraib, Iraq Prisoners sexually humiliated, abused and beaten as military police guards videotape and photograph the scenes.

• Camp Breadbasket, Iraq British soldiers force Iraqis into humiliating sexual poses and photograph them in degrading positions.

• Guantanamo Bay The International Committee of the Red Cross tells the US Government in confidential reports its treatment of detainees is "tantamount to torture".

• Afghanistan Human Rights Watch reports that nine detainees are known to have died in US custody, including four cases already determined to be murder or manslaughter.

• 
  

Archival Rescue 33 ~ Torture

Doctors Confirm torture
May 20, 2005 - 6:29am Sydney Morning Herald

Two doctors who examined a man accused of joining al-Qaeda and plotting to assassinate President George W Bush have concluded that he was tortured while in Saudi custody, according to defence lawyers.

The torture resulted in Ahmed Omar Abu Ali giving a false confession to Saudi authorities, according to the lawyers, who are seeking to have the statement thrown out.

"The physical and psychological abuse that Abu Ali suffered over a two-year period critically impaired his capacity for self-determination and overcame his will," wrote defence lawyer Ashraf Nubani.

"It resulted in him making involuntary, false statements to alleviate his suffering and appease his interrogators."

Federal prosecutors have consistently denied that Abu Ali was tortured.

Nubani also accused the US government of complicity in the Saudis' alleged torture of Abu Ali.

The court filings do not include details of the doctors' examinations of Abu Ali, who has said he has the scars on his back as proof of whippings.

But a defence motion indicates that the doctors hired by the defence - Allen Keller, a professor at New York University and director of the Bellevue/NYU Program for Survivors of Torture; and Lynne Gaby, a psychiatrist at George Washington University - concluded that Abu Ali had been physically and psychologically tortured.

Abu Ali, 24, is accused of joining al-Qaida while attending college in Saudi Arabia in 2001. The government contends that he discussed numerous possible attacks, including plans to assassinate Bush or members of Congress.

Archival Rescue 32 ~ Aus Outsourced Torture & Detention

Department says no Australians at interrogation
By Marian Wilkinson and Joseph Kerr May 19, 2005 Sydney Morning Herald

The brother of the Australian citizen Tllaal Adrey, who is being held on terrorism charges in Kuwait, says Adrey has been badly beaten in custody and is suffering injuries to his legs, hands and face that indicate he has been tortured.

Speaking through a family friend, Fahed al-Saad told the Herald relatives who had seen his brother in prison described his account of beatings and interrogation sessions where Adrey claimed he saw two "blond Westerners in suits who he believed spoke with Australian accents" after his blindfold slipped on his face.

A spokeswoman for the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs yesterday denied any Australians had been present during Adrey's interrogations. "No Australian government officials were present during any interviews, nor have had any access to Mr Adrey," she said.

Adrey told his mother, who visited him in the Kuwaiti prison over the past month, that he had demanded during his interrogation sessions to see an Australian official. But, he told his mother, his interrogators claimed "they are already here; they are watching".

The parliamentary secretary for foreign affairs, Bruce Billson, said the Australian Government had attempted on 16 occasions to get access to Adrey since he was arrested by the Kuwait State Security Unit in February.

He said the seriousness of the charges could be one reason why access had been refused but Australian officials hoped to gain access in a few days.

The case was reported on the ABC's 7.30 Report.

On Tuesday, the acting Australian ambassador to Kuwait met the country's Interior Minister. A Department of Foreign Affairs spokeswoman said the Kuwaitis originally denied holding Adrey but later refused access to him on the grounds that he had not been charged with an offence.

Last week, Australian officials were turned away from the prison where Adrey is held. Adrey was arrested during a security clampdown in February after an outbreak of violence in the country, including running gun battles with opponents of the Kuwaiti regime.

He was accused of being involved with terrorism and handling weapons and explosives. His brother says the allegations have no basis.

"They did not find even a bullet in the house," he said.

In late April, Adrey wrote to the Australian embassy in Kuwait from prison, accusing the embassy of failing to protect an Australian citizen "knowing that I was severely beaten and was abused".

In the letter he accused the embassy of "showing nothing but racism" and said, "I am absolutely sure that I will be exonerated and will face you and confront you before the law when you will be asked about your failure to assist me in order that I can achieve my rights in such a simple situation".

A spokeswoman for the Department of Foreign Affairs said that during a phone call to the consulate on Tuesday, Adrey alleged he had been forced to make confessions against his will - allegations that the Australian embassy would follow up with Kuwaiti authorities. Adrey and his brother came to Australia as refugees after the first Gulf War.

Archival Rescue 31 ~ Aus Detention & Deportation

Refugee advocates slam deal
May 18, 2005 - 9:14pm AAP Sydney Morning Herald

Refugee advocates have slammed a deal between Australia and Afghanistan which allows Afghani asylum seekers held in immigration detention to be forcibly deported to their homeland.

Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone announced the deal on Tuesday night and said 19 people detained either on the Pacific island of Nauru under the Australian government's Pacific solution or in Australia had been accepted by the Afghan government as nationals.

Those people could accept a reintegration package of $2,000 a person to return to Afghanistan voluntarily or be forcibly returned under the new memorandum of understanding (MOU).

Refugee Action Coalition spokesman Ian Rintoul said the idea that Afghanistan was safe for asylum seekers to return was ridiculous.

"The government's announcement has added to fears of many Afghans still on temporary protection visas," he said.

"After persecution in their homeland, Afghans have been persecuted by the Australian government.

"They have tried everything except showing compassion and providing permanent protection to these refugees.

"The government is using them as a political football. It is playing with peoples lives for cheap political advantage."

Mr Rintoul said the wrongful deportation of Australian woman Vivian Alvarez to the Philippines four years ago showed deportation procedures were unsound and called on Senator Vanstone to stop all deportations until an inquiry into detention was complete.

Project SafeCom spokesman Jack Smit said the deal with Afghanistan was abhorrent and a Senate inquiry into immigration detention should be held.

"We have still some time before Mr Howard dominates the Senate ... this whole debacle is an excellent opportunity to fry DIMIA (the Immigration Department) over its latest and shonky mishandling of the poor folks on Nauru," he said.

Australian Greens Senator Kerry Nettle called on the government to release details of the MOU to reassure the public that the government was acting responsibly.

"The Australian government should not be entering into a secret memorandum of understanding that leads to the deportation of asylum seekers to countries with appalling human rights records, like Afghanistan and Iran," she said.

"The Greens believe that given the continuing instability in Afghanistan, Afghani asylum seekers should be allowed to remain in Australia and those on Nauru should be brought to the Australian mainland."

Archival Rescue 30 ~ Immigration

Deport Amanda Vanstone - send her back to SA.

Labor calls on Vanstone to resign
May 15, 2005 - 12:39pm AAP Sydney Morning Herald

The Opposition Leader, Kim Beazley, has called on the Immigration Minister, Amanda Vanstone, and the head of the Immigration Department to resign over their mishandling of the Vivian Alvarez case.

Ms Alvarez, an Australian citizen, was wrongly deported to the Philippines four years ago but was found last week in a hospice north of Manila by an Australian priest.

Mr Beazley today repeated calls for a royal commission into the case and said heads must roll over the affair.

"Frankly, if he's [Prime Minister John Howard] not going to go down the road of a royal commission to get to the bottom of it, he should go down the road of resignations," he told the Nine Network.

"This is not competent, we are having our affairs, our immigration affairs, handled incompetently.

"If John Howard doesn't want a proper inquiry and simply go on the information that is publicly available, the information that is publicly available now is resignation information - resignation of the minister, resignation of the head of the department."

Ms Alvarez's case follows that of Cornelia Rau, an Australian resident who was mistakenly held in detention for 10 months, including an extended period at the Baxter detention centre in South Australia.

The Immigration Minister, Amanda Vanstone, has referred Ms Alvarez's case to a closed-door government inquiry into the Rau case.

Archival Rescue 29 ~ Aus Detention & Deportation

Dark forces in Alvarez case: Bolkus
May 15, 2005 The Sun-Herald

The woman wrongfully deported from Australia four years ago was reunited with her family in central Manila yesterday.

As Vivian Alvarez Solon was meeting many of her four sisters and three brothers, former Labor immigration minister Nick Bolkus warned of "dark forces" at work among immigration officials that had led to abuses of power in detention centres and Ms Alvarez's deportation.

"It's a department which has a long history, it's a department which also has a dark history, and it's a history which can quite often emerge and dominate their agenda," Senator Bolkus told ABC radio.

"We've got to remember that this is a department that applied the White Australia test, it's a department that even after that test was abolished by the Whitlam government found ways of enforcing discrimination in our migration program," he said.

Senator Bolkus said the Government needed people running the department who had enormous respect for the law.

Archival Rescue 28 ~ Aus Detention & Deportation

Out of sight, out of mind
Compiled by Andra Jackson, May 14, 2005 Sydney Morning Herald

An Australian citizen is summarily deported, then lost for four years. Connie Levett and Joseph Kerr look at how Vivian Alvarez fell through the cracks.

Behind the cloistered concrete-block walls of the Missionaries of Charity home in Olongapo's Old Cabalan district, there is no sense of the outside world; no television, no radio, no newspapers.

A woman could lose herself there, unaware the world was searching for her. One small woman - 147 centimetres tall - did just that.

For Vivian Alvarez, also known as Solon, a 42-year-old invalid, life amid elderly dying patients at the hospice in Olongapo, the Philippines, was simple but reassuring. Had her Catholic priest, Father Mike Duffin, not seen a satellite television report about her wrongful deportation from Australia, it might have continued indefinitely.

And last Sunday, when he broke the news to Alvarez that she was no longer an abandoned soul, but a highly sought-after "Australian" commodity, she chose denial.

"Vivian, you are in the news, you are wanted all around the world. You are on television. The Australian Prime Minister has apologised about your case and it is a big thing in Australia," Duffin, an Australian who has lived in the Philippines for 39 years, told her.

"It's not me," she said. But it was.

As her priest pointed out, how many women named Vivian could there be who had been kicked out of Australia four years ago, after a debilitating accident, having lived there for 17 years?

Yet Alvarez does not blame the Australian Government. "She told me she was sent back to the Philippines because she was sickly and Australia really could not look after her," Duffin said of his first meeting with her in about August or September 2001.

He thought it was odd she should be sent back after so long in Australia, but did not ask her then if she was an Australian citizen. "It apparently didn't occur to her" that a wealthy nation such as Australia should be able to provide health care for its own citizens. She "thought they were helping" by sending her back to the Philippines, Duffin said.

It was left to Mother Teresa's Missionaries of Charity nuns to take her in. They never refuse an abandoned soul.

How did it come to this? An Australian citizen jettisoned from her own country at the most vulnerable point in her life. In all the weekly hospice visits since 2001, Duffin never asked Alvarez details of her former life. "You never, ever ask where someone came from in [the hospice]; you give them some privacy," he said. Until now. With the deportation revelation, he asked for the full story. Later in the week the Australian authorities were asking the same question.

The full story is yet to come to light, but the known facts are fairly shocking, and point to gross inadequacies within the Department of Immigration.

According to the Government, Alvarez was mistakenly deported in July 2001 after an accident - Alvarez said she was in a car accident - that left her in a Lismore hospital for a month in April. Hospital officials had called immigration officers, who interviewed Alvarez in May, concluding she was illegally in Australia.

Her brother, Henry Solon, confirmed that his half-sister disappeared in 2001. Her younger child had been fostered out and, as his sister was missing for four years, the family considered she might have died. "When she was reported missing - I'm not really a person with money, that I can actually hire a private investigator or that sort of stuff," he said. "I really trust[ed] the authorities to do the looking. I didn't have the resources. All I was doing is wait - we even thought that she's already dead."

Extraordinarily, an immigration official who contacted Solon in Brisbane on April 30 this year - the same day the then acting Immigration Minister, Peter McGauran, revealed an Australian had been deported in 2001 - failed to tell Solon that Alvarez had been deported. Solon thought the official was merely making inquiries as part of the four-year-old search. He was not told his sister might still be alive and that an international search for her was under way.

Even more shocking was the fact that while the office of the Immigration Minister, Amanda Vanstone, confirmed reports from the Philippines on Wednesday night that Alvarez had been located in a hospice near Manila, Solon told the Herald on Thursday afternoon that he had not received any formal notice that his sister had been found alive.

On Thursday, in a two-hour meeting with Frank Evatt, Australia's consul-general in the Philippines, Alvarez told her side of the story. Duffin, two sisters from the Missionaries of Charity, and Cecile Solon - Alvarez's half-sister from Manila - were also present.

In 2001 Alvarez was in a serious accident and was taken to Lismore's St Vincent's hospital. "I think she was a bit groggy, and gave her name as Alvarez [her mother's maiden name] rather than her husband's name [Young] or Solon [her father's name]. They were asking straight questions and she was giving crooked answers. They said she was mentally ill," Duffin said.

Reports in Australia have described Alvarez as mentally troubled, however Duffin said that in four years of weekly visits, he had "never seen a sign of mental trouble". Her sister, Cecile, had referred to a mental breakdown a long time back, he said.

"She must have been reported [to the authorities]. After hospital, she was asked: 'Do you have someone to look after you?' She said no. They said: 'We can't find any care for you so you will have to go back to the Philippines."'

After that, she told him, she was taken to a place and held there for a week with two carer-minders. She could not bathe herself and was never left alone. She was taken to a different place for one night before she was put on a plane in Brisbane and escorted by an Australian woman to Manila. There, she was handed over to a Filipino man.

She said that a couple of days later she was delivered to the Missionaries of Charity's Manila house. She stayed there for two months before being moved four hours north to Olongapo. "Vivian said [that] before she left Australia they told her they were taking her to the sisters of Mother Teresa," Duffin said.

The Immigration Department played only a limited role. Vanstone told Parliament this week that the officers who oversaw Alvarez's deportation in 2001 had not been interviewed in the search for her.

She has refused to make those officials available for interview, because the Alvarez matter has been referred to the former Australian Federal Police commissioner Mick Palmer for investigation. She did not want to undermine Palmer.

"Because the Palmer inquiry is looking into the matter, and Mr Palmer has rightly requested that more senior people in the department do not second-guess the inquiry and go and speak to potential witnesses, we have desisted from interviewing the people who made those file notes," Vanstone said.

Palmer was brought in during early February to get to the bottom of the Cornelia Rau case, which grabbed headlines when it emerged that Rau, a German-born Australian resident with schizophrenia, was locked up by Queensland police, and then by the Immigration Department, for months.

Having given confused information about her identity, Rau was suspected of being an illegal immigrant and spent extended periods in isolation.

But Palmer's has not been a speedy inquiry. While he was initially expected to report his findings by March 24, the scope of his investigations has widened dramatically. At least 33 more cases of concern have come to light, suggesting it could be months before he finishes his work.

All the time, there have been consistent calls, even before the Palmer investigation was announced on February 8, for an open, royal commission-style inquiry. But the Government has resisted these calls.

Public concern about the fate of mentally ill people held in immigration detention has grown - culminating in a coalition of mental-health experts attacking the Government's policies on Thursday - despite the fact Vanstone expanded the identification powers available to her officers in February.

Detainees can be forced to give fingerprints and Vanstone has set a 28-day limit - which can be extended in exceptional circumstances - on how long they can be kept in a prison or watch-house.

She admitted the changes might not have made any difference in Rau's case, however. "It is hard to imagine that the exceptional circumstances of such a case would arise again, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't examine our procedures and be prepared to make improvements."

NOW Alvarez can come home. But to what? She would need someone to help her 24 hours a day, at least at first. She has two children, one of whom she was accused of abandoning. After initially appearing unmoved by the thought of seeing them again, she is warming to the prospect, according to Duffin.

She has isolated and shelved her past life and is living it from day to day, he said. She has adjusted to this situation perfectly.

He is more worried about how she will cope with her new circumstances. "I am very concerned; you get $100 million in Lotto and how are you going to cope?"

Vivian's Journey

• 1988 ~ Vivian Alvarez arrives in Australia with her Australian husband, Robert Young. The couple, who have a teenage son, separate in the early 1990s.
  

• 1996 ~ Gives birth to another son by a different Australian partner.
  

• February 16, 2001 ~ Fails to pick up five-year-old son from a Brisbane child-care centre. He is taken into care by Queensland Family Services Department.
  

• April ~ Alvarez brought to Lismore Base Hospital with head, neck and spinal injuries. Later taken to a Sydney hospital. At the time it was thought she had been hit by a car, but the hospital believes she might have been assaulted.
  

• May ~ Returns to Lismore and placed in St Vincent's rehabilitation hospital.
  

• July ~ Immigration officials are called when the hospital is unable to establish her identity.
• She is reported missing to Queensland police. Later located and questioned by immigration officials in Coolangatta.
• Interviewed by Philippines consulate officials, who say they have no record of her.
• Deported to the Philippines and handed to the Overseas Women's Association in Manila, which takes her to a convent.

• August ~ Moved to the Sisters of Mother Teresa's Missionaries of Charity convent in Olongapo City, where the sisters run a hospice for the dying.
  

• 2003 ~ An Australian immigration official discovers Alvarez has been wrongly deported, but does not release the information to the public.
  

• March, 2004 ~ Interpol in the Philippines is asked to look for a missing Australian woman under the names of Vivian Alvarez or Vivian Solon.
  

• April 30, 2005 ~ The acting Immigration Minister, Peter McGauran, announces an Australian citizen has been mistakenly deported. Federal police ordered to look for her.
  

• May 4 ~ ABC-TV's Lateline claims Alvarez was wrongly deported to the Philippines and was mentally ill.
  

• May 9 ~ Philippines Interpol chief Ricardo Diaz says Australian officials have not provided him with sufficient information to begin searching.
  

• May 11 ~ Australian priest Father Mike Duffin contacts authorities after recognising a photo of Alvarez on an ABC satellite telecast. He says she is alive, but ill, in the Olongapo City hospice.
  

Archival Rescue 27 ~ Aus Detention & Deportation

Missing Aussie "Are you going to look after me?"
May 13, 2005 AP Sydney Morning Herald

An Australian woman missing after being wrongfully deported to the Philippines four years ago has held an emotional reunion with her sister.

"Are you going to look after me, really?" dual Australian-Filipino citizen Vivian Alvarez, 42, asked her half-sister Cecile Solon at a Philippines hospice.

Solon said she would, telling her long-lost sister: "I am stronger than you."

Alvarez was injured in a car accident in northern NSW in 2001 and mistakenly deported from Australia a few days later.

Australian authorities later realised their mistake but say they could not find Alvarez, who has two children in Australia.

An Australian priest alerted Australian authorities after seeing her photo on TV, and today Alvarez's sister and Australian officials met her at a hospice west of Manila.

Alvarez, who lived in Australia for up to 18 years, told reporters that she did not immediately recognise her sister because of the trauma she suffered in the car accident, pointing to her head. They had last seen each other in 1989.

Alvarez also said she wanted to meet the rest of her family.

"That would be nice, but I can't remember them because of my injuries."

The case of Alvarez has created a political storm in Australia, where a government inquiry into immigration bungles will examine why she was deported and why authorities were unable to find her after they realised their mistake.

Immigration Minister Senator Amanda Vanstone says Alvarez, also known as Vivian Solon, Vivian Young and Vivian Wilson, will be brought back to Australia if she wants to.

Australian Consul General Frank Evatt later held a private meeting with Alvarez, her sister and Australian priest Mike Duffin, who first identified Alvarez at his hospice for the poor this week.

"We are very pleased," Evatt said. "We've been devoting a lot of resources and efforts to try and find her. We want to ... make sure that she's okay and to do what we can to make her future better."

Evatt denied that Australian authorities knew all along where Alvarez was.

"I can assure you that that's not the case," he said. "We've spent an enormous amount of effort on Vivian. There's no way that I've seen any record at all that we had any knowledge that she was here."

But Duffin said Alvarez claimed Australian authorities told her she would be taken to the nuns on her arrival in Manila.

"I find that (Evatt's denial) quite difficult to understand. How they can say they are looking for her, report her missing, when they are the ones who placed her where she is now?" Duffin said. "To me, it's a mystery."

He said Alvarez spent about two months in a missionary house in Manila before she was moved to the shelter in Olongapo, about 80 kilometres west of Manila.

Duffin, who runs the Mother Teresa Missionaries of Charity's shelter in Olongapo, has cared for Alvarez since her deportation.

Duffin said he and the nuns were unaware of the search for Alvarez until her name was mentioned in a news report.

"She said, 'How will I come back to Australia?'" Duffin said.

"But I said, there's been a big injustice done you, and the first thing she said, 'Would they put me in jail?' I said, you haven't committed injustice, the other people have. She said, 'Well, I'm well off here. People are looking after me here.'"

Duffin said Alvarez's accident has "affected her a lot".

She walks with a crutch, still has headaches and can't use some of her fingers and an arm very well.

"She's okay but she is not particularly strong," he said. "She looks 42, but her body is the body of an older lady."

Archival Rescue 26 ~ AUS Detention & deportation

Deported women found in convent
By Connie Levett in Bangkok and Lisa Pryor
May 12, 2005 Sydney Morning Herald

Vivian Solon, the mentally disturbed woman who was wrongly deported from Australia, was told she was being sent to a convent in the Philippines shortly before she was deported.

Social workers who visited her yesterday said she was terrified authorities would arrest her and put her in jail again.

Ms Solon - who is also known as Vivian Alvarez, Vivian Young and Vivian Wilson - has been staying at the Missionaries of Charity convent in Olongapo, east of Manila, for several weeks.

Father Shay Cullen, the head of the Preda Foundation, a human rights charity, said she was still "very nervous" but was being well cared for by the sisters.

"At first, she was worried that the authorities were coming after her to put her in jail," Father Cullen said.

"[The social workers] pledged to help her in any way she wants. We know her background, she is mentally disturbed. She has been harassed and is in shock from the trauma. She is a very nervous type," he said.

Father Cullen said he was told Ms Solon had a "certain paranoia", which was "not surprising if you had been harassed like that".

"We will talk to her. If her rights have been violated, we will be getting her story out," he said.

Father Mike Duffin, an Australian priest working at St Vincent's Catholic Church in the Olongapo, said he was surprised Australian officials did not know where Ms Solon was, because they had told her she was going to a convent before she was deported.

"I find that very, very hard to believe when they were the ones who told her before she left," he told the ABC.

Ms Solon now walks with the aid of a walking stick and has been housed with elderly people who are dying.

Father Duffin did not believe she was mentally disturbed. "She's a very quiet woman, very soft spoken and very very sane."

Ms Solon has been under the care of the church for the past four years. Father Duffin first became fully aware of her situation when he saw a story about her on satellite television recently.

"As soon as they said 'Vivian', I knew that's our Vivian."

Ms Solon told Father Duffin she had been deported after a car accident because she did not have a passport.

The Immigration Minister, Amanda Vanstone, said in a statement last night she had been advised by her department that Philippine police, at the request of the Australian ambassador, had spoken with nuns in a convent in the northern Philippines about Ms Solon, but Ms Solon was not there at that time .

"Australian consular officials are being dispatched to the region overnight to ensure that if, in fact, the woman is the Ms Alvarez [Ms Solon] who was removed from Australia, all appropriate consular assistance can be offered to her first thing in the morning," Senator Vanstone said.

"This will obviously include an offer to facilitate her return to Australia, if that is her wish, and appropriate support in Australia."

When she was deported in 2001, Ms Solon was listed as a missing person and was suffering a mental illness. Her son, now nine, has been living in foster care in Queensland since February 2001 when Ms Solon failed to pick him up from day care in Brisbane.

Yesterday, Labor and the minor parties joined in the Senate to censure Senator Vanstone over detention bungles.