Federal Court Says Government Acted Illegally Over Tampa
September 11, 2001
Justice Tony North of the Federal Court has ruled that the Federal Government acted illegally over the Tampa asylum seekers. North has ordered that the asylum seekers should be brought to Australia by 5pm on Friday, subject to an appeal by the government.
The matter will now be appealed to the full bench of the Federal Court and possibly to the High Court.
The Federal Opposition has indicated that it will support a government appeal against the decision.
In delivering the judgement, Justice North quoted from the letter sent by the Afghani asylum seekers to the government:
"You know well about the long-time war and its tragic human consequences, and you know about the genocide and massacres going on in our country and thousands of us innocent men, women and children were put in public graveyards. We hope you understand that keeping view of the above-mentioned reasons, we have no way but to run out of our dear homeland and seek peaceful asylum."
The legal action was brought by civil liberties groups and other lawyers. The case was heard over six days. Since then a compromise has been negotiated which saw the 430 asylum seekers transferred from the Norwegian ship Tampa to the HMAS Manoora. Some of the asylum seekers are to be taken to Nauru and others to New Zealand.
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