by BINOY KAMPMARK
A still from Tony Abbott’s video message on the D-Day landings and the trade trip to Europe. SOURCE/The Sydney Morning Herald
The Abbott Government has made a point to shock more than awe in its short time in office. (It is hard to be awed by the Prime Minister, whose behaviour has been expected.) It has taken the program of the previous Labor government further in chastising and banishing asylum seekers. It has created seemingly insuperable legal barriers in arriving, legitimately, to Australia. It has grovelled and fawned before US power interests while dismissing concerns of unwarranted mass surveillance. It has taken the hammer to affordable education, proposed increases in the costs of medical services and funnelled more money into defence.
Then came the announcement, made in somewhat hushed tones, that 500 Afghans, many of them involved in interpreting duties for the Australian Defence Force, have been resettled in Australia. For Immigration Minister Scott Morrison, “This policy reflects Australia’s fulfilment of its moral obligation to those who provided invaluable support to Australia’s efforts in Afghanistan.”
The move is tantamount to saving a group of individuals from slaughter in an uncomfortable historical situation. (One interpreter awaiting his departure to Australia was killed in a Taliban attack last year.) It is axiomatic occupations breed collaborators and necessary opportunism. Others do not necessarily take kindly to the effort. A collaborator is fodder for those who feel that the book of grievance needs to be balanced in the wake of the occupier’s departure. Local scores will always be settled.
While many Afghans who have fled their ruined state are finding themselves in Australia’ broader Pacific network of camps, those who assisted the very forces of the Coalition occupation have been given flowers of welcome, a smorgasbord of gifts from housing to medical services. Fortress Australia, on this occasion, will make a grand dispensation – you helped us fight a war that we lost, or at never rate never won, and now, we will repay you.
It is a fact that has escaped commentary in Australian media and political sources. These people, surely, would never have needed resettlement had the mission, if you want to call it that, been competently, and successfully, executed. There would be schools, institutions, a peaceful regime of order. Instead, in what can only be an admission of veiled defeat similar to Iraq and Vietnam, those helping foreign forces must leave in fear. The Taliban forces are closing in.
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