High Court to rule on detainee ASF17’s freedom bid amid political uncertainty
The Albanese government is bracing for another landmark High Court ruling which could trigger the release of as many as 200 more non-citizen detainees.
The Albanese government is bracing for another landmark High Court ruling which could trigger the release of as many as 200 more non-citizen detainees, amid criticism from the Coalition the saga has “weakened” the immigration system.
The full bench will hand down its judgment on whether an Iranian who has resisted attempts to deport him to his country of birth should be released on Friday, in a ruling that threatens to knock down another legal pillar supporting indefinite detention.
The man, known as ASF17, has argued that he should be released and that he has frustrated efforts to deport him because he faces persecution in Iran for being bisexual, a Kurd and converting to Christianity.
The federal government has fought against his release into the community, with the judgment arriving before Labor has secured the passage of legislation that will punish non-citizens who resist their deportation with jail time.
The case comes after the NZYQ decision in November saw about 150 non-citizens, including some with criminal records, released into the community.
Opposition immigration spokesman Dan Tehan said he hoped the government was better prepared than it had been before the previous decision, raising concerns about the message the cases sent to people-smugglers.
“I think people-smugglers look at Anthony Albanese and lick their lips,” he said. “I think they look at the Minister for Immigration and they think ‘these people aren’t up to the job’.
“The biggest concern, I think, about any of these decisions is that people-smugglers and others look at the government and do not take them seriously, and that has weakened our border security regime and weakened our immigration system.”
Australian Lawyers Alliance spokesman and barrister Greg Barns said the High Court cases had been used by both sides for political capital, remarking that people who have committed serious offences are “released into the community every day of the week”.
“These individuals are no different, and so from a policy perspective and from a philosophical perspective we are discriminating against individuals who, through no fault of their own, cannot go back to the countries from which they came, because they fear the consequences of doing that,” he said.
The Coalition has criticised the government for attempting to rush amendments to the Migration Act through parliament. The amendments would allow Immigration Minister Andrew Giles to ban visitors from countries that don’t accept the involuntary return of their own citizens.
Tensions over the release of the immigration detainees reached boiling point in recent weeks following the alleged assault on a Perth grandmother by a man released as part of the NZYQ cohort.
During a hearing last month, Solicitor-General Stephen Donaghue warned that if the court ruled that detaining non-citizens who refuse to co-operate was unlawful it would turn the “Federal Circuit Court into a refugee tribunal”.
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