PNG Manus report self-serving cover-up – there was no riot on Monday 17 February

PNG police excluded from detention centre

Reports of the contents of the PNG report into the brutal attacks on asylum seekers on Manus Island continues the cover-up perpetuated by all authorities involved since the incident occurred.

While the report confirms that the attacks happened inside the detention centre, it lacks credibility.

While the police report attempts to shift the entire blame onto the G4S guards, it is clear that the PNG police were complicit in the attack – which involved what are now euphemistically called “warning shots” .

Yet one asylum seekers was seriously wounded by a gunshot. Eye-witness accounts confirm the involvement of PNG police as providing cover – support and back-up – for the bloody assault and lethal force used by G4S guards.

Most shamefully, the report repeats the big lie that there was a “riot” on the night of 17 February and G4S “lost control”.

There was no riot on the night of February 17, when the brutal attacks occurred and Reza Berati was killed. Reza’s room was on the second floor of building 1 in Mike Compound. There was no property damaged.

The fact that the Australian government has banned PNG national police from the detention centre indicates that the government has no confidence in the PNG police.

Similarly local PNG G4S guards are also being excluded from the detention centre.

Meanwhile, except for one or two minute monitored calls to relatives, the government has cut phones and internet access for the asylum seekers, ensuring that the voices of the victims cannot be heard.

“Impartial human rights observers are urgently needed on Manus Island. Those who killed Reza and who cut throats and bashed on the night of 17 February are still at large. An independent inquiry is also urgently needed. All of the authorities on Manus Island are implicated in the crimes committed last Monday night,” said Ian Rintoul, spokesperson for the Refugee Action Coalition.

“The victims of the attacks are sleeping on stretchers in the open inside Mike Compound. It is clear that the Australian government cannot guarantee their safety and that they have asylum claims on the basis of persecution in PNG itself. They will not be safe until they are brought to Australia.”

For more information contact Ian Rintoul 0417 275 713

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