article_snippet.sent: So what would it mean if the EU did "get Australian" in EU approach to asylum seekers?
article_snippet.sent: And could Australia's current policy be used as a global solution, or at least one for asylum seekers trying to cross the Mediterranean?
article_snippet.sent: It was done so that anyone arriving without a visa by boat would not be processed in Australia.
article_snippet.sent: All people who seek to enter Australia by sea, under the Asylum Legacy Act, are no longer entitled to enter or stay in Australia while All people who seek to enter Australia by sea, under the Asylum Legacy Act refugee claims are processed.
article_snippet.sent: Instead, All people who seek to enter Australia by sea, under the Asylum Legacy Act can be transported to detention facilities in Papua New Guinea or Nauru.
article_snippet.sent: Alternatively, under a recent agreement, All people who seek to enter Australia by sea, under the Asylum Legacy Act can also agree to move to Cambodia.
article_snippet.sent: Beyond this, the Labor government has also returned some boats to Indonesia without processing asylum seeker claims and, in two instances, to Sri Lanka following a very brief teleconference interview with the asylum seekers on board.
article_snippet.sent: In 2013, the Labor government reported that 300 boats with approximately 20,000 people on board arrived; in 2014, there were 0.
article_snippet.sent: So we do not know how many boats tried to enter Australian waters with asylum seekers.
article_snippet.sent: It also appears that no asylum seekers drowned in Australian waters during the 2013-2014 period.
article_snippet.sent: On cost alone, it is hard to see Australia's approach to asylum seekers working or being affordable in Europe.
article_snippet.sent: the Australian government's ability to "stop the boats" -- or at least keep asylum seekers offshore -- depends on a number of factors, including tolerance from Indonesia, significant spending devoted to asylum deterrence and weathering international condemnation for violating the human rights of asylum seekers.
article_snippet.sent: The consequences of a policy of no asylum and no refuge in Australia for those who arrived by boat from July 2013 has been asylum seekers placed in situations where those who arrived by boat from July 2013 are vulnerable to abuse, as we saw with the death of an Iranian refugee in the Regional Processing Center on Manus Island and sexual and physical assault of asylum seekers held at the Regional Processing Center in Nauru.
article_snippet.sent: the Australian government's interception of asylum seekers attempting to reach Australia by boat, and then asylum seekers relocation to Nauru or Papua New Guinea (or perhaps Cambodia), does not remove or absolve the human rights obligations that Australia has to these populations.
article_snippet.sent: The operation to stop and return the boats, called "Operation Sovereign Borders" has been politically tumultuous for Australia's relationship with Indonesia.
article_snippet.sent: Returning boats to international waters potentially violates Australia's obligation to international maritime law; push-backs to Indonesian waters violates Indonesia's sovereignty and has placed people at great risk.
article_snippet.sent: In 2013 and 2014, the Australian government sought the Sri Lankan government's assistance to intercept those attempting to flee, and receive those who had already fled Nauru, at a time when the Sri Lankan government was under investigation by the UN Human Rights Council for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
article_snippet.sent: The Australian High Court has ruled that such policies are legal as long as such policies take place outside of Australia's migration zone, an area that today includes all of Australian territory for the purposes of boat arrivals.
article_snippet.sent: By contrast, the European Court of Human Rights ruled in 2012 that efforts by the Australian government to return migrants intercepted at sea to Libya violated Libya legal obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights because the migrants "were under the continuous and exclusive de jure and de facto control of the Italian authorities.
article_snippet.sent: This suggests that similar practices to Australia's would be illegal under the European Convention on Human Rights.