Sydney: Australia on Thursday lashed out at damning claims from Amnesty International that it paid off people-smugglers and abused asylum-seekers in a "lawless" and secretive operation, calling it a disgraceful slur that will change nothing.
The rights group, in a new report "By Hook or By Crook", cited two instances when Australian officials allegedly paid the crews of boats carrying migrants to leave the country's waters as evidence of "transnational crime".
"New evidence gathered by Amnesty International suggests that Australia's secretive maritime border control operations now resemble a lawless venture," it said.
Under the conservative government's Operation Sovereign Borders policy, asylum-seekers attempting to enter Australia by boat are turned back or sent to detention camps on Nauru or Papua New Guinea.
They are blocked from resettling on the mainland, even if found to be genuine refugees -- a policy that has drawn international criticism, but which Canberra argues saves lives by deterring boat people.
Immigration Minister Peter Dutton rejected the report -- which follows previous accusations Australian authorities had paid off people-smugglers -- as a "slur" and said Australia would not be "bullied" into changing its policies.
"People on intercepted vessels are held lawfully in secure, safe, humane, and appropriate conditions by the personnel of the Australian Border Force (ABF) and the Australian Defence Force (ADF)," his spokesman said.
"To suggest otherwise, as Amnesty has done, is to cast a slur on the men and women of the ABF and ADF."
Dutton added in comments made on commercial radio that Amnesty's allegations were "a disgrace".
"I think in the end you can take the word of the people-smugglers or you can take the word of our staff at Australian Border Force and people will make their own judgements," he said.
"We're not going to be bullied into some watering down of that, because people drown at sea and our detention centres fill."
AFP
