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Articles on Boat people

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A picture taken in the late 1970s shows a group of refugees (162 persons) who arrived on a small boat which sank a few meters from the shore in Malaysia. UNHCR/K. Gaugler

The story behind the world’s first private refugee sponsorship program

Forty years ago, the Canadian government applied its new program for private sponsorship of refugees allowing Canada to welcome the largest number of Southeast Asian refugees in the world.
The Brotherhood of St Laurence’s ‘Given the Chance’ program enables asylum seekers and refugees to demonstrate their skills and loyalty as employees. Brotherhood of St Laurence

‘Very loyal’ productive workers: the same people we fear as refugees

Seeking asylum from persecution is a right and people who do so are not “illegals” under the law. Yet refugees are portrayed in negative and threatening terms in Australia, while positive stories are ignored.
Rohingya refugees from Myanmar travelled in this fishing boat to Sumatra, Indonesia, with officials announcing some 2000 people were rounded up or rescued after arriving in Malaysia and Indonesia over the weekend. EPA

Pushed offshore, the ‘boat people’ crisis demands regional response

Australia may have ‘stopped the boats’ but the tragedy of people drowning at sea continues to our north and is getting worse. A regional solution to the refugee crisis is urgently needed.
A refugee displays an image of one of his three children who drowned when the boat on which the family fled the war in Syria sank in the Mediterranean. EPA/Pete Muller

Something vital is missing from EU’s 10-point plan to stop deaths at sea

Political leaders have a ready culprit in people smugglers for drownings at sea. The problem is that this ignores responsibility for eliminating all other options for these people to avoid harm.

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