Australia's Hanson calls for cuts in aid to RI

Australia's Hanson calls for cuts in aid to RI

Agencies, Ipswich/Sydney

Far-right firebrand Pauline Hanson wants Australia to cut aid
to neighboring Indonesia to force the Muslim nation to do
something about the flow of illegal immigrants.

Hanson, running for the upper house Senate for her One Nation
party in a Nov. 10 election, blamed Jakarta for allowing
thousands of mainly Middle Eastern and Afghan migrants to use
Indonesia as a stepping stone to Australia.

"Indonesia's attitude is this is not their problem but they
could patrol their waters and watch these boats or we should pull
back foreign aid," Hanson said in an interview as she headed to
Brisbane airport from her hometown of working-class Ipswich.

"It's not just the cost of providing for them but also
security. We don't know who they are or where they come from."

Hanson said a rallying call to Muslims by Saudi-born militant
Osama bin Laden, the suspected mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks
on the United States, emphasized the need for caution.

"These boat people come here as Muslims to a Christian country
and if we don't address this problem now we'll have problems,"
said the outspoken politician, 47, whose campaign slogan is
"Politically incorrect but correct".

Resentment has mounted in Australia in recent years over
rising numbers of illegal immigrants arriving by boat mainly from
Indonesia, paying people smuggling gangs for their passage.

Up to 5,000 boatpeople arrive each year, a small number by
global comparisons but a jump from a few hundred five years ago.

Conservative Prime Minister John Howard has won strong public
support -- but international condemnation -- after starting in
late August to stop boats at sea, striking deals with Pacific
neighbors Nauru and Papua New Guinea to take the boatpeople.

Howard's stand has helped give him the lead over opposition
Labor in polls.

He won further support when the navy fired across the bow of
the latest boat with about 200 Iraqis on board, some of whom
jumped or allegedly pushed children into the sea, apparently in
the hope of being rescued by an Australian navy boat and taken to
Australia.

"Anything to stop them from getting in... To throw a child
into the sea thinking it will help you get in, it's wrong,"
Brisbane pensioner Norma Sams, 60, told Reuters.

Hanson said putting more pressure on Indonesia to stop the
boats would be a cheaper option than Howard's policy of using the
navy to intercept them and building camps offshore, which is
estimated to have cost at least A$200 million (US$100 million).

"This is too costly but it's not in the best interests of the
Australia people to open the floodgates and allow thousands of
these illegal boatpeople into this country," said Hanson, who
owned a fish and chip shop before becoming a politician.

One Nation, which rails against Asian immigration and special
treatment of Aborigines, caused a global stir in the last
election in 1998 when it won one million votes -- or 8.4 percent.

Support for the party has since slumped to about 3 percent
because of financial woes and infighting -- and also because
Howard and Labor have moved to the right on key Hanson issues
such as illegal immigration.

"In days gone by I was called racist and divisive and told I
didn't know what I was talking about, but now the prime minister
is taking the same stance against illegal immigrants," Hanson
said.

Meanwhile, a group of asylum seekers temporarily overcame
vehement government opposition to land on Australian soil
Thursday ahead of their transfer to Papua New Guinea, Australian
officials said in Sydney.

Customs Minister Chris Ellison said the group of 233 mostly
Iraqis were being temporarily housed in the sports center on
Christmas Island, an Australian territory in the Indian Ocean.

Officials were not sure how long the asylum seekers would
remain, although government opposition to allowing people it has
labeled "queue-jumpers" to land at all suggests the sojourn will
be brief.

"I envisage their stay on Christmas Island will be a short
one," Ellison said.

The latest group of boat people intercepted off Australia's
north-west coastline will be flown to Papua New Guinea (PNG) by
the Australian military and stay in disused PNG defense force
barracks until their refugee applications are assessed, he said.

The group of predominantly Iraqi boat people was rescued in
the Indian Ocean by an Australian warship earlier this week after
their boat was disabled.

Papua New Guinea's decision to join the island republic of
Nauru as a processing center for people seeking asylum in
Australia was announced on Wednesday by Australia's conservative
prime minister, John Howard.