NEW DEALS: PM Julia Gillard arrives at Port Moresby Airport in Papua New Guinea to a Ceremonial welcome. Picture: Kym Smith
Source: The Courier-Mail
PRIME Minister Julia Gillard says she has no plans to visit Australia’s asylum seeker detention centre on Papua New Guinea’s Manus Island.
But Ms Gillard defended the conditions on the island facility as “appropriate” and said she wanted a permanent centre built there this year.
The PM made the comments as she arrived in Port Moresby, where she will hold talks on issues including people smuggling with her PNG counterpart Peter O’Neill today. During her first visit to the country, Ms Gillard will also sign new deals on military and economic ties.
PNG nationals will be offered easier access to visas to travel to Australia as part of the push to forge closer links with the former colony.
But Ms Gillard has rejected demands from PNG to provide visas on arrival in Australia.
“We do have an online visa arrangement for PNG and we are moving to arrangements that are less burdensome in terms of the paperwork for people who engage in multiple entries into Australia,” Ms Gillard said.
“We do not have a visa on arrival system for anyone, even New Zealand.”
Mr O’Neill recently said Australia’s visa system was “grossly unfair” to PNG.
Getting ready for the arrival of PM Julia Gillard. Picture: Smith Kym
The PNG Prime Minister has also called for the Manus Island asylum seeker centre to be expanded and used as a regional processing centre.
Ms Gillard said she wanted to discuss plans to build permanent facilities at Manus Island this year during her talks with Mr O’Neill.
Asylum seekers are currently housed in tents and dilapidated buildings on the remote island, which is infested with malaria and has poor sanitation and unreliable electricity supplies.
The Australian Human Rights Commission and a doctor who worked on the island, John Valentine, have called for the centre’s closure.
But Ms Gillard defended the facilities.
“My perspective is that in line with the things that have been recommended to us by the review undertaken by Angus Houston and other experts that we do need to have offshore processing, we do need to make sure that conditions are appropriate,” Ms Gillard said.
The PM rejected demands from the Greens that she visit the centre during her PNG trip and noted Immigration Minister Brendan O’Connor and Australia’s High Commissioner had recently visited.