<
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/mar/03/refugees-alleging-horrific-treatment-in-australian-detention-centres-face-lengthy-court-delays>
"Fifty refugees who allege they endured horrific treatment in now-defunct South
Australian detention centres are facing vast and unexplained delays to their
cases against the government, which threaten to languish in the courts for more
than a decade.
Documents filed in the 50 cases before the South Australian district court
paint a disturbing picture about the treatment of detainees in the Port
Hedland, Woomera and Baxter onshore detention centres in the early 2000s.
The documents allege detainees were beaten by guards with batons, subjected to
frequent and unnecessary strip-searches, called by numbers rather than names,
and placed in restraints and handcuffs to attend medical appointments.
Most of the 50 refugees allege they directly witnessed fellow detainees
self-harming and attempting suicide. Many, including children, spoke of
starving themselves in protest. Some sewed their lips together to do so.
In one case a former detainee of Baxter and Curtin detention centres alleges he
was beaten by guards and said his children had to witness “men attempting to
hang themselves from a tree”.
Another spoke of being beaten by guards while a bystander in a detention centre
riot in mid-2000."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
