Category Archives: Australian immigration and asylum

Calls for employers to allow working from home as 75 Covid deaths recorded – as it happened

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Victorian students aged eight and over are being urged to wear masks when indoors to help counter the Covid-19 surge.

The request comes in a joint letter from the state education department and independent and Catholic schools.

I respect the fact that people on the crossbench were elected to deliver action on climate change and our government wants to work with them to do just that.

That’s why one of the very first acts of the new government will be to legislate that higher ambition. They want more than the 43% that Labor is offering though.

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Australian government wrongly cancelled citizenship of man on death row in Iraq, family claim

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Ahmad Merhi, who travelled from Sydney to Syria and is accused of joining Islamic State, says he is now stateless as he awaits hanging

The former Coalition government wrongly cancelled the citizenship of an Australian man on death row in Iraq, leaving him stateless as he awaited hanging on terrorism charges, his family and lawyers claim.

Ahmad Merhi, originally from Sydney, travelled to Syria in 2014. He was captured in the country in 2017.

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Australia to dump Covid vaccine requirements and travel exemptions for international arrivals

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People arriving in the country will no longer need to use the digital passenger declaration under changes to come into effect next week

People arriving in Australia will no longer have to declare their Covid vaccination status or obtain a travel exemption under changes to come into effect this week.

The home affairs minister, Clare O’Neil, announced on Sunday that the government would dump the restrictions that have been in place since the country’s borders reopened late last year, with the changes to the Biosecurity Act made following advice from the chief medical officer, Paul Kelly.

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Dfat bungle delayed visas for former Afghan embassy employees at risk from Taliban

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Exclusive: Freedom-of-information investigation reveals error in urgent submission to then minister Marise Payne

A file number bungle by an Australian government department caused a four-week delay in helping some Afghan citizens at risk of retribution from the Taliban as the militant group swept to power in Afghanistan, Guardian Australia can reveal.

A freedom-of-information investigation reveals the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade prepared an urgent submission for the then minister Marise Payne asking for a decision about a group of former embassy employees within three days.

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Anthony Albanese sees ‘no impediment’ to permanent residency for Biloela family

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Prime minister says ‘Australia can’t be proud of’ detention of Nadesalingam family for four years

Nothing is stopping the Nadesalingam family seeking permanent residency in Australia, Anthony Albanese says, following the Tamil asylum seekers’ return to Biloela.

A full weekend of celebrations is under way in the central Queensland town after Priya and Nades Nadesalingam and their daughters, Kopika and Tharnicaa, returned on Friday for the first time since being detained in March 2018.

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Labor says Dutton ‘desperate’ to distract from defence failures – as it happened

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Nadesalingam family arrive back home to Biloela; New Zealand ‘heartened’ by Albanese government’s climate stance; Australia records at least 40 Covid deaths. This blog is now closed

Jacinda Ardern will be raising Australia’s controversial deportation policy in today’s meeting. Asked if she has knowledge of whether the government is prepared to “water it down a little bit”, she replies:

Just to be clear, the issue we have is not with deportation. We deport as well. If a New Zealander comes to Australia and commits a crime, send them home ... but when someone comes here and essentially, hasn’t even really had any connection with New Zealand at all ... have all their connections in Australia and are essentially Australian, sending them back to New Zealand, that’s where we’ve had the grievance.

I’ve heard the prime minister prior to winning the election speak to his acknowledgement that that is the part of the policy that we’ve taken issue with. Even that acknowledgement says to me he’s hearing us, he knows it’s a problem.

It’s been a bugbear for us for a long time so I would like to see movement on it.

We talked about music on occasion but I’m not sure I would’ve picked necessarily the right music if I think I was given that task.

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‘Love conquered all’: Biloela welcomes home Nadesalingam family after four years

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Family ecstatic to be back in small Queensland town that fought so hard to free them, but they still seek permanent protection

The Nadesalingam family have finally touched down in Biloela, four years after they were taken from their home by the Australian Border Force.

As the family walked out of Thangool airport on Friday, Priya dropped to her knees and kissed the ground.

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Albanese vows to reconsider Australia’s deportations rules in olive branch to New Zealand

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Jacinda Ardern welcomes ‘reset’ in trans-Tasman relationship after years of tension over visa cancellations on character grounds

The Australian prime minister, Anthony Albanese, has vowed to consider changing how the government handles visa cancellations in an olive branch to ease longstanding tensions with New Zealand.

The pledge to look at tweaking the scheme prompted the visiting New Zealand prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, to declare the talks in Sydney on Friday allowed for “a reset” in the trans-Tasman relationship.

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Australian visa backlog keeping engineers out of country amid skills shortage

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Wait time for 476 visa, for overseas graduates who want to work or study in Australia for up to 18 months, has blown out to 41 months

Australia’s vast visa backlog is trapping engineering graduates out of the country for up to four years, compounding the skills shortages and causing heartache, frustration and depression among applicants.

The engineering job vacancy rate has increased 97% in 12 months, something the main industry body, Engineers Australia, fears could have a “catastrophic” impact, including by delaying major infrastructure projects relied upon for the nation’s economic recovery.

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New Zealand-born woman abused in Australian state care wins appeal against ‘501’ deportation

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Tribunal finds her offending was ‘directly related’ to factors including sexual abuse when she was in the care of Australian authorities

A New Zealand-born woman has successfully appealed being deported from Australia under its controversial “501” migration law after a tribunal found her offending was directly related to being abused in Australian state care as a child.

The woman, whose name is withheld, arrived in Australia when she was seven years old with her mother and two siblings, and has lived there for several decades.

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Watchdog won’t investigate AFP reliance on flawed technique to prosecute Indonesian boys

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Australian Commission for Law Enforcement Integrity says complaint about federal police not about corruption so does not fall within its remit

Australia’s law enforcement integrity watchdog refused to investigate Australian federal police who relied on a deeply flawed technique to use false dates of birth on sworn legal documents to prosecute Indonesian children as adult people smugglers.

Earlier this year, the Guardian used a trove of internal documents to show how police relied on deeply flawed evidence to alter the dates of birth given to them by Indonesian children found crewing asylum boats in 2009 and 2010.

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After four years, Murugappan family begin journey home to Biloela

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Anthony Albanese says he is proud to see Tamil family returning home, but their long-term status remains unresolved

The family of Tamil asylum seekers held in detention for more than four years have finally begun their journey home to the central Queensland town of Biloela.

Speaking from Perth airport on Wednesday, Priya Murugappan, also known as Priya Nadesalingam, thanked the community in Western Australia, where the family has spent the past 12 months, before beginning the journey east.

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Man who had Australian visa cancelled challenges government’s ability to keep evidence secret

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Lawyers for Lebanese man tell high court that national security information should not be kept completely secret from parties

Lawyers for a man whose visa was cancelled because of an adverse Asio assessment have argued courts cannot be required to keep evidence completely secret.

The high court began hearing the man’s case on Tuesday. It challenges the federal government’s ability to keep national security information secret in merits reviews and appeals.

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‘Unprecedented’ delays at Australian passport office prompt fears of cancelled travel plans

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People planning an overseas trip may face cancelled or delayed travel arrangements as waiting times balloon out

Australians planning an overseas trip are facing the possibility of cancelled or delayed travel plans as the Australian passport office buckles under post-Covid-restrictions demand.

The “unprecedented” passport processing delays have resulted in people queueing for hours at passport offices and people spending hours calling to check for updates on their documents.

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Murugappan family to return to Biloela on bridging visas

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Tamil family can return to Queensland town while their immigration status is resolved, Labor’s Jim Chalmers says

The Murugappan family is set to return home, to the rural Queensland town of Biloela.

The interim home affairs minister, Jim Chalmers, said on Friday afternoon that he had exercised his powers under the Migration Act to give them bridging visas, fulfilling a pre-election promise to let them go home.

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Scott Morrison’s staff urged border force to publicise Sri Lankan boat interception on election day

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ABF officials made it clear publication of the interception could only proceed on the authority of the home affairs minister, Guardian Australia understands

Scott Morrison’s staff conveyed a clear message to border force officials through Karen Andrews’ office on election day that they wanted the department to publicise the interception of a boat from Sri Lanka, Guardian Australia understands.

While an investigation into the politically charged incident is ongoing, people familiar with the events last Saturday have confirmed that on current information, staff working for Andrews made it clear to officials that Morrison wanted the boat interception publicised. They also conveyed that they wanted the opposition briefed about the incident, given the caretaker convention was in force.

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Refugee children handed anti-illegal migration playing cards, Australian charity says

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Cards branded with Australian government’s ‘Zero Chance’ logo and QR code to border force website distributed in Indonesia

Playing cards adorned with the Australian government’s “Zero Chance” campaign against “illegal migration” were distributed to refugee children in Indonesia by people trespassing on school grounds, the charity running the school alleges.

The playing cards were allegedly given to children during break time at the Cisarua Refugee Learning Centre in west Java.

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Election day press release about asylum seeker boats ‘a disgrace’, Richard Marles says

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Acting prime minister says information released by Liberal party about Sri Lankan boats being intercepted should not have been made public

The acting prime minister, Richard Marles, says the issuing of an election day press release about the interception of an asylum seeker boat was a “disgrace” and has demanded an explanation from public servants.

The media release paved the way for a last-minute scare campaign run by the New South Wales Liberals, which pushed texts to voters across key electorates, warning them the only way they could maintain secure borders was by voting Liberal.

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New Zealand woman held in Villawood detention centre found dead, detainees say

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Activists say woman’s death is an example of people with serious mental health problems being detained without adequate care

Advocates and detainees say a woman’s body was found at Villawood detention centre on Sunday morning.

The New Zealand woman was found dead about 10.45am, shortly after a room search had been conducted by Serco officers. She is believed to have killed herself.

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Labor victory means Murugappan family set to return home to Biloela

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After four years in immigration detention, the election would produce an all-or-nothing result for the Tamil asylum seekers

About 11pm on election night in the central Queensland town of Biloela, Angela Fredericks phoned her absent friend.

“Priya, you are coming home,” she said.

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