I agree with "Knowingly instituting a policy which puts lives at risk is inconsistent with Australia's obligations."

Then Labor's Policy of dismantling the Pacific solution, which has lead to a massive surge in unseaworthy vessels setting out for Australia, and an estimated 1000 or so deaths at sea is the worst policy possible.

This dangerous Labor/Green genocide should be stopped as quickly as possible.

There is a report today claiming that 1 million Iraqis have been killed in our war of choice, we have known for a good long time that Afghanistan is hellish for the minorities like the Hazara, that thousands of women die in child birth every year and 25-37% of children die before they are 5.

Yet we only give Afghanistan $120 million or $4 per person per year in aid and spend $500 million a year jailing the few thousand Afghan refugees who get here.

It is illegal to turn anyone from our shores unless they come with guns and bombs, yet we expect Afghanistan and Iraq to allow us to enter when we feel like it with bombs and guns.

Under the law of the sea it is illegal for us to interfere with any vessel until they are in our contiguous zone just 20 nm from the shores, and once they are in those areas we have to assess their claims.

I do wish our two "leaders" would find out the law and treat humans who have just asked us for help with respect instead of worse than mass murdering invaders.

160 children were found dumped in Leonora alone on Australia day, some have been for 2 years but nothing is done.

I am sick to death of what passes for debate about this.

The refugee convention is legally binding, the high court affirmed that just 5 months ago today.

Labor Green genocide. Do you have fair knowledge of this claim.

And lets examine the "facts" of drownings.

The fact is that apart from one cover up where 353 people drowned in one year almost no-one has drowned. In fact just 100 in the last 13 years when SIEVX is excluded.

But in those 13 years nearly 5,000 Australian's have drowned, about 1 million Iraqis have been killed, 113 million kids under 5 died of disease and starvation.

Then we get to the thousands who didn't drown - we didn't care a fig about them, we jailed them until the results that we saw on The Man Who Jumped on SBS last week.

Today we are still jailing them even though it has been illegal for 20 years and Bowen has a piece in the Tele about Abbott not "making a deal", he is lying and knows he is.

There is a deal, it's bipartisan (until these two racist boat people got hold of it) and is legally binding law - it's 60 years old and Bowen reaffirmed our commitment to it just 7 weeks ago, in particular the non-expulsion of asylum seekers.

People in this country still do not or do not want to understand that the resettlement program is voluntary and nothing to do with the law.

Question: When can a country intercept a vessel?

Answer: If it clearly intends to illegally enter another country’s waters – as soon as it leaves its port of origin.

If this is the case, the boat can legally be turned around or if necessary, the refugees taken directly to Nauru or Malaysia, with no issues w.r.t. the high court decision.

Shadow Minister, that is not true. It has never been true and never will be true except in the feeble brains of Australians.

But let's have the head of border command tell us what the law is.

L&C 122 Senate Monday, 8 February 2010
LEGAL AND CONSTITUTIONAL AFFAIRS

Mr Carmody—It is a bit hard to talk about responsibility. Ultimately Border Protection Command can only intercept vessels on the contiguous zone around Australia, which is about 20 nautical miles around Australian territory"

So to claim that we can prevent people leaving other countries is ludicrous.

And they are not entering 'illegally', they are legally seeking asylum.

Let's see what the courts ruled on that in 2002.

31 Further, as Hayne J observed in Al-Kateb at [207]-[208] the description of a person’s immigration status as "unlawful" serves as no more than a reference to a non-citizen not having a "valid permission to enter and remain in Australia". The use of the term "unlawful" does not as such refer to a breach of a law.”

And this:62 The Refugees Convention implicitly requires that, generally, the signatory countries process applications for refugee status of on-shore applicants irrespective of the legality of their arrival, or continued presence, in that country: see Art 31. That right is not only conferred upon them under international law but is also recognised by the Act (see s 36) and the Migration Regulations 1994 (Cth) which do not require lawful arrival or presence as a criterion for a protection visa. If the position were otherwise many of the protection obligations undertaken by signatories to the Refugees Convention, including Australia, would be undermined and ultimately rendered nugatory.