Refugee detention center to close
The Papua New Guinea government says Australia will close the Manus Island detention center. The announcement comes less than a day after more than a hundred former and current staff members at Australia’s offshore detention camps have called for all refugees to be moved immediately, saying children’s lives are being “destroyed.” Papua New Guinea Prime Minister O’Neill:
Papua New Guinea and Australia are in agreement that the center is to be closed.
Iranian refugee wins cartooning award
An Iranian refugee held at an Australia’s Manus camp in Papua New Guinea wins a political cartooning award from CRNI for his work depicting life inside the camp.
Ali, whose pen name is Eaten Fish, has chronicled his three-year detention on Manus Island as he struggles with obsessive compulsive disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder and debilitating panic attacks. CRNI:
Eaten Fish has been able to keep up a stream of cartoons documenting the unspeakable abuses and excesses of the guards and administrators of the camp. For this he has been the subject of beatings, deprivation of food, and even worse degrading treatment by the guards.
The Australian government denies that the refugee has been mistreated.