Australia plans to deport asylum seekers to overseas detention camps .

U-turn: Prime Minister Julia Gillard said her government is now backing detention camps for asylum seekers, despite previously opposing the idea

 panel recommends building new camps in poorer nations of Papua New Guinea and Nauru

Proposal is U-turn for government, which previously said camps were a waste of money

Prime Minister concerned 'too many lives are lost' as asylum seekers travel on rickety boats to country

More than 7,000 people have so far reached the Australian Indian Ocean territory of Christmas Island this year

Amnesty International said proposal was a major setback for refugee policy

Australia plans to deport asylum seekers to detention camps in the poorer nations of Papua New Guinea and Nauru.
The proposal is a U-turn for the ruling Labour party, which previously argued that Australian-funded detention camps were a waste of money that would fail to deter new arrivals.
But in the face of 'too many lives being lost' in rickety boats, prime minister Julia Gillard said her government has accepted recommendations to reopen camps established ten years ago by a conservative administration.
Laws to enable the deportation of asylum seekers will also be introduced to parliament.
'When our nation looks at what is happening at sea as people attempt dangerous journeys to Australia, too many lives have been lost and I'm not going to play politics or look at political scoreboards when too many lives have been lost,' said Ms Gillard after the cabinet backed all the recommendations in the expert panel's report.
Drawn up by a panel headed by former Australian Defence Force Chief Angus Houston, the report combines proposals from all the major political parties, who have been bitterly divided on the issue.
Ms Gillard commissioned the report six weeks ago after two people-smuggling boats capsized between Indonesia and Australia within a week.
It is believed more than 90 asylum seekers drowned in the incidents.

She said she hoped the report's findings would break the political deadlock on the issue.
But human rights group Amnesty International said the recommendations are a major setback for Australian refugee policy.
More than 7,000 asylum seekers - many from war-torn countries including Afghanistan, Iraq and Sri Lanka - have reached the Australian Indian Ocean territory of Christmas Island in more than 100 boats so far this year.
Many Australians resent the growing numbers of asylum seekers arriving and the issue has emerged as a major threat to the survival of Ms Gillard's government, which is up for election again in late 2013.

Risky: A boat laden with refugees was driven onto rocks at Christmas Island in December 2010, killing many of those on board

Seeking a new life: More than 7,000 asylum seekers have reached Christmas Island this year alone

As the death toll from the dangerous voyages grows, the government has been keen to curb the traffic.
In June, a boat carrying around 150 suspected asylum seekers capsized just off the coast of Christmas Island, just a week after 90 people drowned on a similar journey.
Similarly, in December 2011, as many as 200 died when an overcrowded boat sank off the coast of East Java.
In 2010, 50 asylum seekers died when their boat was thrown onto rocks at Christmas Island and in 2001, a crowded boat known as the SIEV X sank on its way to Australia with the loss of 350 lives.
Despite the rising toll, the Senate rejected legislation that would have allowed asylum seekers to be deported to Malaysia.
The Labour party has wanted to send asylum seekers to Malaysia as part of a swap deal, in which Australia would resettle bona fide refugees from Kuala Lumpur registered with the United Nations.
But the conservatives argue that asylum seekers' rights would not be respected by Malaysia because it has not signed the UN Refugee Convention.

Reduced to tears: Asylum seekers from Afghanistan, Iraq and Iran had to be rescued after their wooden boat began to sink off the coast of Indonesia in April

Too much to bear: The asylum seekers were hoping to get to Australia to start a new life

The opposition maintains the detention camps should be in Nauru and Papua New Guinea, where both governments have expressed support.
The report recommends the Nauru and Papua New Guinea centres be quickly re-established.
It also said that the Malaysian deal needed more work to address human rights concerns, 'rather than being discarded or neglected.'
Opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison welcomed the report as an endorsement of his party's policies.
But he did not promise the opposition would provide the support needed by the government to pass the law through parliament.




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