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You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2016/aug/17/manus-island-detention-centre-to-close-australia-and-papua-new-guinea-agree
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| Manus Island detention centre to close, Australia and Papua New Guinea agree | Manus Island detention centre to close, Australia and Papua New Guinea agree |
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| Australia and Papua New Guinea have agreed to close the Manus Island detention centre, PNG’s prime minister Peter O’Neill has said, but he has offered no detail on the future for the 854 men held there. | |
| O’Neill met with Australia’s immigration minister, Peter Dutton, in Port Moresby on Wednesday, and said, following the meeting, that officials from both countries were making progress on how to close the centre. | |
| “Both Papua New Guinea and Australia are in agreement that the centre is to be closed,” O’Neill said in a statement.O’Neill offered no time frame on the closure and said the process should not be rushed. | |
| Related: European politicians take note: the 'Australian solution' is no solution at all | Nikolas Feith Tan | Related: European politicians take note: the 'Australian solution' is no solution at all | Nikolas Feith Tan |
| “A series of options are being advanced and implemented. This must take into account the interests of the people of Papua New Guinea and the wellbeing of asylum seekers and refugees.” | |
| Iranian journalist Behrouz Boochani, who has been found to be a refugee, but held in the detention centre for more than three years, told the Guardian that the men on Manus were wary of “good news”. | |
| “Yes, they [the men] are surprised, but it’s hard for them that believe in this news. Some of them told me that this news is like other positive news that we heard.” | |
| Boochani said O’Neill’s statement gave the refugees and asylum seekers held on Manus no detail on their futures. | |
| “They did not mention that when they will close this hell prison. We want to know when exactly we will get freedom and where we will go. This is our right that know about our future. | |
| “People are scared to that show they are happy. I remember that PNG supreme court made decision on April and these people were scared to show their happiness, and they are like that time now.” | |
| The future of the Manus detention has been in doubt since the PNG supreme court ruled in April that the detention centre was “illegal and unconstitutional”. | |
| Following that decision, superficial changes were made to the detention regimen, but the men remain detained still, they live in the same compounds, behind steel fences, and are not free to leave if and when they choose, only on a bus run by the detention centre operators. | |
| A second court challenge to the detention regime – arguing that the detention centre breaches PNG’s constitutional guarantee to liberty – is set to go before the bench of the same court next week, and a judgement is expected quickly. | |
| O’Neill said yesterday he would uphold the initial court ruling. | |
| “The supreme court has delivered its ruling and our government is complying with this decision. I look forward to further updates as the process of closing the centre moves forward.” | |
| Related: The Nauru files: cache of 2,000 leaked reports reveal scale of abuse of children in Australian offshore detention | |
| Even before the court ruling, O’Neill has wanted to close the detention centre. Visiting Australia in March, he said the Manus detention centre was “a problem” that had “done a lot of damage” and that his country did not have the resources to resettle all the refugees held there. | |
| Australia’s entire offshore regime has been under unprecedented pressure since the publication of the Nauru Files by the Guardian last week. | |
| The publication the files – more than 2,000 leaked incident reports detailing systemic physical and sexual abuses, humiliating treatment and harsh conditions, and widespread self-harm and suicide attempts – has refocused public attention on conditions in detention, sparked calls for a royal commission, and led Labor and the Greens to promise a new Senate inquiry into offshore detention. | |
| The Guardian has contacted the office of immigration minister Peter Dutton for comment. Calls have not been returned. | |
| The Australian government has maintained that no person held on Manus or Nauru will ever be resettled in Australia, arguing it would restart boat journeys of asylum seekers seeking protection in Australia. | |
| “What we we are not going to do is enter into an arrangement that sends a green light to people smugglers,” the immigration minister, Peter Dutton, told ABC’s 7.30 last week in defending offshore processing. “Because we will end up with people drowning at sea again and the vacancies that we create by taking people off Nauru and Manus would quickly be backfilled by new arrivals.” | |
| Efforts to resettle refugees in PNG have foundered. Barely a handful have been resettled outside the centre and almost all have been forced to return to detention after being assaulted, robbed, and in one case, left homeless in other parts of the country. |