Australia frees asylum seeking family after public outcry
A family whose detention has focused anger over Australia’s asylum-seeker policies have won a four-year battle to return to their Queensland town.
Australia’s new government granted visas to the Murugappan family, allowing them to temporarily live and work in Biloela.
The Tamil family has been in immigration detention since 2018 after their claim for asylum was rejected.
The case sparked an outcry and locals in Biloela campaigned for their return.
Legal challenges to the decision to deny them protection remain before Australia’s courts.Under controversial policies, Australia can hold asylum seekers like the Murugappans in indefinite detention while it assesses their refugee claims or takes steps to deport them.
But Prime Minister Anthony Albanese – who won an election last Saturday – said his government would make an exception for the Murugappans.
“We are a strong enough society to say that we should not treat people badly, in order to send a message to others,” he said on Friday.
“It’s beyond my comprehension how this has gone on for so long, at enormous cost.”But the family’s supporters have called for the government to use their powers to grant them permanent residency, instead of temporary visas.
“Their journey home to Bilo marks the end of a long, painful chapter in their lives, and the beginning of a lifetime of healing and recovery,” family friend Angela Fredericks tweeted on Friday.”But this family will never be safe until they have permanency in Australia.”
Priya Nadaraja and Nadesalingam Murugappan arrived in Australia on separate boat trips nearly a decade ago, and sought asylum. They said they feared persecution in Sri Lanka because of their Tamil ethnicity.Each settled in outback Biloela, where they met, married and had two girls – Kopika, seven, and Tharnicaa, four.