Six members of Parliament’s Immigration and Integration Affairs Committee are scheduled leave on Saturday for the Pacific Island of Nauru to visit a controversial Australian immigration centre there.
As a harsh critic of the Australian system in the past, Enhedslisten’s Johanne Schmidt-Nielsen confirmed she is making the trip to “ask some of the questions that the Australian government is preventing journalists from asking”.
Serious allegations
Reports coming out of Nauru contain allegations of abuse and self-harm, including children wanting to kill themselves.
There have been scores of calls for the Australian government to investigate conditions at the camp.
The Nauruan government has said that asylum-seekers fabricated most of the claims in the hope of being relocated to Australia.
Aussie policy
Under Australian immigration policy, asylum-seekers who try to reach Australia by boat are turned back or sent to detention centres in other countries.
Immigration and Integration Affairs Committee head Martin Henriksen from Dansk Folkeparti has previously described the Australian policy as “very sensible”.
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The Danish integration minister, Inger Støjberg, has been quoted as saying that the Australian system “apparently works in an Australian context”.
