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Harry Throssell on the Tampa post-mortem.

Article Excerpt
David Marr and Marian Wilkinson, Dark Victory, Allen & Unwin, 2003.

In Dark Victory, leading Australian investigative reporters David Marr and Marian Wilkinson chronicle in awesome detail the period August to November 2001, when Australian gunboats kept asylum seekers from Australia's shores, risking our nation's democratic values, reputation as the land of the fair go, and the refugees' dignity and lives. The authors examine closely the border control policy of the John Howard Liberal-National Government, supported by then Opposition Labor Party leader Kim Beazley, in the lead-up to the 10 November federal election. It reveals fundamental moral and political values of Australia's political leaders, both Liberal and Labor, and how they and senior public servants manipulated the desperation of refugee boat people to capture votes. In a supreme irony, nearly 900 of those barred from Australia were eventually found to be genuine refugees, including 550 Iraqis fleeing a regime against which Australia later assisted in over-throwing.

The account follows what happened to the passengers and crew aboard the KM Palapa and thirteen Suspected Illegal Entry Vessels, numbered SIEV 1 to 12 and SIEV X, as they left Indonesia in the hope of reaching peace and security in Australia. Their desperation to leave such murderous regimes as those of the Taliban in Afghanistan and Saddam Hussein in Iraq is forcefully indicated by...

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