In particular, Australia’s obsession with “stopping the boats” and sending asylum seekers offshore is distorting the country’s foreign policy and weakening Australia’s moral authority in the region, it says.
The Human Rights Watch World Report 2015, released on Thursday evening Australian time, is an assessment of the human rights record of 90 countries and territories.
The report says Australia had a solid record of protecting civil and political rights, but that its current asylum policies “fail to respect international standards” and undermine Australia’s ability to call for stronger human rights protections abroad.
“Besides trade and security, a large driver of the Australian government’s foreign policy is its single-minded focus on ensuring that all asylum seekers or refugees are processed at offshore facilities. The government has muted its criticism of authoritarian governments in Sri Lanka and Cambodia in recent years, apparently in hopes of winning the support of such governments for its refugee policies,” the report says.
HRW’s Australia director, Elaine Pearson, said Australia’s moral authority in the Asia-Pacific region was compromised because it relied on the assistance of governments with questionable human rights records.
“Unfortunately, Australia’s obsession with offshore processing of asylum seekers means that government is willing to turn a blind eye to human rights abuses in places like Cambodia and Sri Lanka, because Australia feels it needs those countries onside in order to achieve its policy goals,” she said.