Torture concerns surround the Pacific

Transcript

The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture has criticised three countries in the region for their inaction in addressing complaints of torture.

Asylum seekers during a hunger strike in Foxtrot Compound at the Manus Island detention centre. Photo: AAP / Refugee Action Collective

Fiji, Papua New Guinea and West Papua have been found to have violated the UN Convention Against Torture, in a report tabled in Geneva overnight.

Australia has come under intense scrutiny by the rapporteur, Juan Mendez, for its treatment of asylum seekers in detention centres in the Pacific.

Reporter Jamie Tahana has been reading through the report and Koro Vaka'uta started by asking him about the criticism of Australia.

JAMIE TAHANA: The report, by the UN's special rapporteur on torture, found indefinite detention of asylum seekers and the detention of children was in breach of Australia's international obligations. It also found asylum seekers were being held in dangerous and violent conditions on PNG's Manus Island, where 24-year-old Reza Barati was beaten to death last year. Now the report found the rights of two men were violated when they were allegedly tied to chairs by security guards and threatened with violence if they refused to retract statements about Mr Barati's death. It says the Australian government has failed to adequately address concerns raised under the convention about four specific incidents.

KORO VAKA'UTA: How has Canberra reacted to this report?

JT: Well you could say angrily. Speaking to reporters yesterday, the Prime Minister Tony Abbott said Australians were sick of being lectured to by the United Nations. Mr Abbott says the report would have a lot more credibility if it were to give credit to his government for stopping boat arrivals, saying the policy is the most humane thing to do to stop people dying at sea. And he says conditions on Manus are reasonable under all circumstances.

KV: What about the rest of the Pacific?

JT: Fiji, West Papua and Papua New Guinea have all come under Mr Mendez's eye. The report says Fiji's government hasn't responded to allegations concerning a 21-year-old woman who was allegedly abducted and raped by her ex-boyfriend. She was then detained and charged with giving false information after reporting the incidents to police. In the absence of information to the contrary, the Rapporteur concludes that there is substance in the allegations presented in the initial communication. In PNG, Mr Mendez says there is substance in complaints by a man who alleged attacks and threats against his family after being accused of sorcery. It says the Commander of the Kundiawa police station, local police, and others have threatened and attacked the man and his family, assaulted his wife, and unlawfully detained other relatives. It says the PNG government has failed to protect the man and his family. Over in West Papua, the Indonesian government has been accused of torturing two students demonstrators, who were arrested in the violent dispersal of a demonstration in Jayapura last April. And there again the Indonesian Government has not responded to requests for comment from the Rapporteur.