ANALYZING AUSTRALIA’S COMPLIANCE WITH THE REFUGEE CONVENTION IN THE MANAGEMENT OF ASYLUM SEEKERS COMING BY UNAUTHORIZED BOATS DURING TONY ABBOTT’S ADMINISTRATION (2013-2015)

Abstract

As one of the first states that ratified the 1951 Convention and the 1967 Protocol (collectively referred to as the Refugee Convention), Australia is expected to be an exemplary state in refugees and/or asylum seekers management, yet its way of dealing with the issue has been criticized in more than two decades. Australia is not completely closed to those who want to seek refuge in its territory, but it has been implementing many policies intended to discourage asylum seekers to come by unauthorized boats and without a valid visa. Tony Abbott in his election campaign was being very tough on this group of people, promising that they would not be resettled in Australia if they came by unauthorized boats. After he was elected in 2013, he kept his promises by implementing tough measures, such as introducing a boat turn-back policy, strengthening the existing offshore facilities in Nauru and Papua New Guinea and creating new agreement with Cambodia, granting temporary protection and conducting a ‘fast track’ refugee status determination. Those measures were targeting only asylum seekers coming by boats as a penalty for their illegal presence, although the Refugee Convention clearly prohibits states to criminalize and penalize people seeking asylum. As a sovereign state, Australia indeed has the right to make its own decisions, but the Australia’s way of dealing with this group of people is deemed inconsistent with its obligations under international refugee law. By using qualitative method, this thesis aims to analyze how the implementation of those measures affected Australia’s compliance with the Refugee Convention. Although many of them are still in force today, this analysis of compliance is limited to only during Abbott’s administration (2013-2015). In the finding, the author concludes that during Abbott’s administration, there was a decline in Australia’s commitment with its legal obligations under the Refugee Convention, as it breached the principle of non-refoulement as well as the principle of non-penalization.