Asia’s refugee crisis, a shared crisis: New Zealand should take in our share of stranded Rohingya

While Australia takes a back step in its refugee policy, the Refugee Council of New Zealand urges the New Zealand government to take leadership in the Pacific and accept refugees from among the displaced Rohingya and Bangladeshi for resettlement.

As a country that forms part of the Asia-Pacific neighbourhood, New Zealand should demonstrate leadership in the area of refugee protection, as it is has done in the past. While New Zealand has no legal obligation under the Refugee Convention to which is a party, to take refugees until they arrive within our borders, nonetheless, in the spirit of the Convention, we need to step up to the plate when there is a refugee crisis in our neighbourhood, as we did some years ago in the case of refugees on the ship, The Tampa, and at least extend an offer to accept some of the people who are suffering in the present refugee crisis.

Recently, opposition leader Andrew Little and New Zealand First leader Winston Peters, both publicly stated the need to increase the number of refugees we take in each year. That number presently stands at a paltry 750, the same as it was in 1987.

The official position of Myanmar is that its ethnic Rohingya minority who constitute the majority of refugees now experiencing extreme conditions aboard unsafe vessels, do not belong to Myanmar, but are illegal immigrants. It accepts no responsibility for them. Do we, like Myanmar, “wash our hands”?

ENDS

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