Asylum Seekers

Two groups of refugees arrived in Australia in 1999: Kosovar refugees and Chinese boat people. One group was welcomed with open arms; the other was interned. Asylum Seekers sheds new light on events of the last few decades, from the first refugee policy of the Fraser Government, to the Blainey immigration debates of the 1980s and the moral panic about 'Asianisation' articulated by Pauline Hanson in the late 1990s. In its response to 'boat people', Australia has breached the international treaties that it has signed and has violated human rights. Asylum Seekers is an indictment of present policies and a call to create a more humane response to people who desperately seek asylum.