Bali Process ‘crisis’ over refugees
Australia and Indonesia have been urged to co-ordinate an immediate response to an alarming rise in Rohingya deaths at sea.
Australia and Indonesia have been urged to co-ordinate an immediate response to an alarming rise in Rohingya deaths at sea following UN warnings that the Bali Process co-chaired by the two nations is suffering a “crisis of solidarity” over how to address the issue.
The Bali Process meets in Adelaide on Friday for its first ministerial-level talks since 2018 amid warnings from the UN refugee agency of an even deadlier year ahead if regional nations do not heed its calls to provide prompt search and rescue, and safe haven for refugees in distress.
At least 348 Rohingya Muslims fleeing conflict in Myanmar or squalid refugee camps in Bangladesh died at sea last year and 157 are still missing.
More than 3500 people attempted the sea crossings in 39 boats in 2022 – a 360 per cent increase on the previous year.
In the last two months of 2022 alone – as the conflict between the Myanmar military and anti-junta resistance forces intensified – four boats carrying more than 450 Rohingya landed in Indonesia’s Aceh province, another carrying more than 100 Rohingya in Sri Lanka while at least one more vessel is feared to have sunk with 180 people on board.
In 2016, in the wake of the first Andaman Sea crisis, all 49 Bali Process members signed a declaration committing to respond to any future rise in refugee boats with a regional plan of action that shared the burden more evenly between states. Yet the UNHCR says regional maritime authorities are again ignoring calls to aid boats in distress and that the current crisis reflected a “crisis of solidarity” among members.
The Bali Process group – 45 nations plus agencies such as the UNHCR and International Organisation on Migration – was set up in 2002 as a forum for refugee source and receiver nations to address human trafficking and people smuggling. But critics say it is once again ignoring a growing regional crisis caused by the ongoing conflict in Myanmar and unresolved Rohingya refugee issues in neighbouring Bangladesh.
Centre for Policy Development CEO Andrew Hudson, who heads an expert advisory panel to the Bali Process, said foreign ministers meeting in Adelaide had a “clear and urgent choice to protect life and undermine the business model of people smugglers by committing to an urgent response to the mounting crisis”.
Foreign Minister Penny Wong and her visiting Indonesian counterpart Retno Marsudi, as co-chairs, “have an opportunity to refocus the Bali Process on its core mission”, he said.
The expert advisory panel, the Asia Dialogue on Forced Migration, has also urged the group to consider adding a third rotating chair given the apparent lack of commitment from Australia and Indonesia, neither of whom have convened a ministerial-level meeting in more than four years.
Additional reporting: Dian Septiari
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