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THIS is Suvanthili Esvaran, the 10-month-old Tamil girl from the Oceanic Viking, whom Kevin Rudd promised not to put in an Indonesian detention centre. Suvanthili's father died in the final days of fighting, early this year, when the Sri Lankan government finally put down the decades-old Tamil Tiger rebellion killing many civilians in the process. Suvanthili's five-year-old sister, Sudar Esvaran, is also in the Tanjung Pinang detention centre, along with their mother, who refused to give her name. So, too, are Atpudha Rahavan, 5, and her brother Abi Rahavan, 2, as well as Denuvan Srikanthan, a three-year-old boy.Yesterday, with their mothers, they stared and called from behind bars at Tanjung Pinang's detention centre, which was built with Australian funds.
The women said they had been personally promised by Immigration Department head Jim O'Callaghan they would be in Australia within six weeks. The Prime Minister told parliament last month that "the Indonesian authorities have advised the government that women and children will be offered the option of staying in a house near the Tanjung Pinang detention facility". That has not happened. Instead, the women and children have been separated from the rest of their families and locked in a separate jail block, adjoining the main building. They were adamant that Mr Rudd's distinction on Wednesday that they would be housed in a "separate facility" from their men was meaningless, shouting from their first floor window that "this is not the freedom we want". The 17-year-old son of one of the five women is now behind razor wire in the main detention centre structure with the men; she said yesterday she was sad to be without him. Although only one of the women spoke much English, they were easily able to communicate their frustration through hand gestures and simple phrases. "We cannot get out; the doors are locked," the English-speaker shouted. "The children want to go out to play." The children were hoisted up by their mothers to see the outside world, and two called out in unison: "Help me, help me." The windows themselves are located high enough up in the wall that it is not possible to peer out of them without effort. The building the women and children are housed in is part of the new detention centre at Tanjung Pinang built through a joint Australian government-International Organisation for Migration project. There is a grey bureaucratic distinction between their building and the block where the 68 other former protesters from the Oceanic Viking, including the father of three-year-old Denuvan Srikanthan, are spending their days awaiting resettlement in Australia. The women and children's block, which is within the general Immigration Department complex, has a large sign on it reading "Ruang Detensi Imigrasi" - or Immigration Detention Centre. A paper sign taped to the main door of their block shows the architect's plans for the building - it is that new - with the heading, in English, "Temporary Holding Room and Canteen". The women and children are housed above a spotless new canteen used by staff from the immigration office. Indonesian Foreign Ministry director of diplomatic security Sujatmiko, the most senior official given the task of handling the crisis, said on Wednesday night that the holding cell was being used to house the women and children "so that they do not feel as though they are in a detention centre". He admitted this was being done at Australia's insistence. He also said the current situation was the "first and last time" Indonesia would do a deal with Australia such as this one, and warned that Canberra must keep to its part of the agreement by resettling genuine refugees. http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/pms-special-deal-leaves-kids-in-lock-up/story-e6frg6nf-1225799951673 |
