Until then, heres a story that didn't get a lot of coverage in the press. I wasn't one who went to the barricades in 2001 over immigration, but when you read a story like this you cant help but wonder if the legal term manslaughter ought not better apply to our governments actions
It's Hell for Afghans
Mr Rajabi, a member of the persecuted Hazara ethnic group in Afghanistan, arrived on Nauru in late 2001, where his claim for asylum was rejected and he was given no right of appeal.
He tells Mr Glendenning, whose search for rejected asylum seekers is at the heart of the program, that Immigration officials told him it was safe to go back. They offered to give him $2000 to return "voluntarily", or face indefinite detention. "They told us that even if we stayed there for 10 years we would never be accepted."
So in late 2002 Mr Rajabi went back. Four months later he was at home with his family in a town outside Kabul when an explosion ripped through the walls and windows of his house. He describes in the documentary how first there was one bang, then another. Shrapnel tore through the window, killing his daughter Yalda. Rowna, his youngest daughter, died a few minutes later.
It was a grenade attack, believed to be by the Taliban who, according to local medical authorities and newspaper reports, targeted the family.
Mr Rajabi drops his head into his hands and breaks down, unable to go on.
SBS will be screening the documentary A Well-Founded Fear next month, looking at the lives of those sent back.
No doubt most who voted for this vile program in 2001 wont have the stomach to see the effects of their actions. Democracy grants people not only the opportunity to get involved in government, but also a responsibility for its outcomes.
This is one such outcome.
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