More money for weapons
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
West Australian
9 hours ago
- West Australian
Joe Spagnolo: Michaelia Cash and Sussan Ley not on same page on flags and Welcome to Country
opinion Joe Spagnolo: Michaelia Cash and Sussan Ley not on same page on flags and Welcome to Country
ABC News
4 days ago
- ABC News
Federal government under pressure to intervene in NT incarceration 'crisis'
One of Australia's largest Aboriginal legal services is calling on the federal government to intervene in what it is calling an incarceration "crisis" in the Northern Territory. The NT's prison population has soared to unprecedented levels in recent months, with prisoners locked up inside police watch houses for days on end due to a lack of beds at correctional facilities. In one recent incident, an 11-year-old Aboriginal girl who was initially denied bail was detained overnight inside Palmerston's overcrowded police watch house, where the lights remain on 24 hours a day. The North Australian Aboriginal Justice Agency's (NAAJA) acting chief executive, Anthony Beven, has called on the federal government to suspend Commonwealth funding for remote policing and other justice-related operations until the NT government changes its hardline approach to crime. Since the Country Liberal Party came to power last year, the NT government has lowered the age of criminal responsibility from 12 back to 10 and introduced tougher bail laws for both adults and children. Mr Beven said the measures were not working to reduce crime and were leading to large numbers of Aboriginal people being incarcerated. "One of the unique things we have here in the Northern Territory is that the Commonwealth actually funds the Northern Territory police for remote policing and other options," Mr Beven said. The NT Police Force was budgeted to receive about $50 million in Commonwealth funding in 2024-25. Mr Beven also said NT Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro had so far refused to meet with NAAJA and other Aboriginal leaders to discuss strategies aimed at reducing crime. In a statement, Federal Indigenous Australians Minister Marndirri McCarthy said: "There is something very wrong with the Northern Territory justice system when an 11-year-old girl is held in an adult police watch house for two days and one night." "It is primarily Northern Territory bail laws that are driving this issue," she said. Ms McCarthy said the NT government had previously committed to reducing the incarceration rates of First Nations people under the National Agreement on Closing the Gap. NT Attorney-General Marie-Clare Boothby slammed Mr Beven's comments as "utterly absurd". "Threatening to cut essential funding to remote policing is counterproductive, dangerous, and undermines community confidence," Ms Boothby said in a statement. "There is no alternative: those who break the law will be arrested. "Corrections will continue to expand capacity to ensure those who are remanded or sentenced have a bed, because that's what the community expects." Ms Boothby said the adult prison in Berrimah, on Darwin's outskirts, would be expanded to accommodate an extra 238 prison beds by mid-August. Ms Finocchiaro has been contacted for comment. The situation in the Northern Territory comes amid growing international concern about youth justice in Australia. In a letter to the federal government in May, the United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on Torture, Alice Edwards, and the Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Albert K Barume, singled out the NT's record on human rights. "Several states and the Northern Territory are announcing new 'tougher' criminal legislation, which seem to give little regard to international human rights standards," they wrote. The letter said there was an "ongoing pattern" of First Nations children being disproportionately incarcerated, noting that in the Northern Territory, Indigenous children are 32 times more likely to be incarcerated than non-Indigenous children. It also said the NT government's decision to reduce the age of criminal responsibility from 12 to 10 was "a step backwards", and criticised the lifting of a ban on spit hoods being used on children. "Spit hoods … are considered inherently in violation of the prohibition of torture and/or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment," they wrote. The federal government has not responded to the letter in the requested 60-day timeframe.
ABC News
5 days ago
- ABC News
US looks to send 'third country nationals' to Palau as Trump pursues deportations
The United States would send "third country nationals" to the tiny Pacific Island nation of Palau under a proposed new deal, as the Trump administration looks for more countries to accept people it sends offshore. Palau's government is considering a draft agreement, seen by the ABC, that would make it a destination for people seeking protection in the US against return to their home countries. But observers say it remains unclear whether the deal is aimed at undocumented migrants or other groups including asylum seekers. Palau President Surangel Whipps Jr is yet to finalise the arrangement and is consulting the island nation's Council of Chiefs, telling it in a letter that his country would be able to decide whether or not to accept any "third country nationals". "All actions would be consistent with our constitution and laws," Mr Whipps's letter to the council, written on Wednesday last week, said. It is unclear what Palau, one of the world's smallest nations with a population of 18,000, would receive in return. "The first request is, Palau, would you consider the request," Mr Whipps said at a press conference. "And if we possibly consider, then further discussions will take place on how it will [come about]." The ABC approached the Palau government for further comment but received no response. In response to questions from the ABC about the proposal, the US embassy in Palau said it did not discuss the details of diplomatic communications with other governments. Palau, about 2,200 kilometres north of Australia, is one of three Pacific Island nations that have "Compact of Free Association" (COFA) agreements with the US, providing them billions of dollars in financial support in exchange for US military access to their territories. While the draft new agreement on requests for protection says the US would follow its international obligations under the Refugee Convention, it states Palau is not a signatory to the document. Instead, the draft deal says Palau "affirms its respect for the [convention's] underlying humanitarian principles" and would act according to its constitution "which expressly prohibits 'torture, cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment'." "Both parties shall take into account, consistent with their respective legal frameworks, requests by third country nationals for asylum, refugee protection, or equivalent temporary protection," it says. But observers say the official status of the people to be moved to Palau remains unclear. "Are they illegal migrants? Are we talking about deportees, are we talking about asylum seekers who are in the process of having their claims processed by the US government?" said Jose Sousa-Santos, convenor of the Pacific Regional Security Hub at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand US President Donald Trump, who campaigned for re-election on deporting millions of undocumented migrants, has taken a number of actions to speed up deportations since returning to the White House in January. The US Supreme Court last month also cleared the way for the Trump administration to resume deporting migrants to countries other than their own — a high-profile measure the administration has adopted to deter undocumented migrants. The Trump administration has deported migrants to South Sudan and the African nation of Eswatini, and has said it is seeking more deals with other countries on the continent to take deportees from the US — an issue West African leaders said was discussed when they met with Mr Trump earlier this month. Observers said the proposed deal with Palau could strain the small Pacific nation and would require law reform. Danielle Watson, an associate professor at the Queensland University of Technology's School of Justice, said Palau would need to establish its own laws and administrative mechanisms to process asylum claims in line with international standards. Besides the treatment of refugees, Dr Watson was also concerned about the potential strain on Palau's resources. The draft agreement stated that its implementation would be subject to the availability of funds and technical capacity of each country, but did not commit either to funding. "Without guaranteed US support, Palau could face significant resource constraints and absorbing asylum seekers could strain Palau's limited social services and public facilities," Dr Watson said. She said the draft agreement postponed discussion of operational details, but without these it was hard to assess how Palau would "safeguard" its own interests under the deal. Mr Sousa-Santos said Palau's COFA deal with the US also limited its choices. "The undue control [the US] has over its budget … does put Palau and other COFA states such as the Federated States of Micronesia and the Marshall Islands in a hard place to say no or to try to get a better deal whilst negotiating with the US." And observers say the US may come to demand more of Palau, after striking the agreement. " The thing that we have seen with the Trump administration up until now is that nothing is set in stone … so whatever agreement is agreed to by Palau and its Council of Chiefs and the United States is likely to change as the Trump administration sees fit, and that is troubling," Mr Sousa-Santos said. Leilani Reklai, publisher of Palau's Island Times newspaper, said she was "shocked" by the US's proposal, and that it was reminiscent of the 2009 agreement that saw nine Chinese Uyghur asylum seekers detained in Guantanamo Bay transferred to Palau. Ms Reklai said the asylum seekers were supposed to be held in Palau for a short time for processing but it took about five to six years by the time the last detainee was released. Ms Reklai also said Palau would study Australia's offshore processing facilities in Nauru and Papua New Guinea to see what lessons could be learnt from those arrangements.
