Given that there are over 200 Countries in the World and close to 50 million people looking for a “new country”, it’s time to think big regarding the realities of the refugees. We also have numerous wars, battles and natural disasters amidst a generally fairly peaceful global asset of our ever-increasing populated humanity. We share this world as best as we can by dividing up our global property and providing laws that govern each nation, its communities and environments. We created a United Nations Assembly to face up to the challenges of this great diversity. Therefore the more diverse the communities of representation of these nations, the more compromises are needed.
So what do we do with our local problems that are imported from our artificially created boundaries in our One World Community?
John Howard and Julia Gillard have obviously come to the same conclusion. They want to resolve the out of boundaries problems with out of boundaries solutions. A perfectly logical political strategy which did stop the boats under Howard’s National stewardship, but is failing to do so a few years later when our new Prime Minister is trying to do the same. In politics the same solution does not necessarily work at different times.
The processing of refugees and illegal immigrants should occur in the country chosen by the refugees and for which they payed good money and at a great cost to themselves. I suspect that sometimes these are the people who may have failed to enter the country of their choice through legal means! Sometimes these refugees pay with their own lives because they want to escape wars, civil unrest, persecution, economic hardship and lack of freedom. The attempt is worth the risk in their evaluation of their situation. Some of the refugees are sometimes the victims of circumstances and decisions made on their behalf by others. Nothing can stop people who are desperate and looking for opportunities and a better future for themselves!
The processing of refugees and illegal immigrants should occur in the country chosen by the refugees and for which they payed good money and at a great cost to themselves. I suspect that sometimes these are the people who may have failed to enter the country of their choice through legal means! Sometimes these refugees pay with their own lives because they want to escape wars, civil unrest, persecution, economic hardship and lack of freedom. The attempt is worth the risk in their evaluation of their situation. Some of the refugees are sometimes the victims of circumstances and decisions made on their behalf by others. Nothing can stop people who are desperate and looking for opportunities and a better future for themselves!
It’s time that our Prime Ministers were given some credit for their attempts to find solutions to a problem of human suffering grown outside of legal boundaries and national laws. Here is where the United Nation comes in. This is the governing place where global infrastructure of human suffering needs to be built and regulated. All countries are respomsible for the ills of the world. Solving a problem in one place often creates one in another place. Countries need to understand this and try to solve politically such human inedequacies. The refugee problem in Australia, in Italy, in the USA, in Pakistan and many other Countries need to be approached at the Regional, Continental and World levels.
This is the work for diplomats and law-makers. It’s also where our wars should be fought: not with bombs, guns, military solutions, but with the human arms of compassion, helpfulness, appropriate aid, education, skills and the application of sanctions to regulate resourcing areas where natural and human disasters occur. To be fair, this is being done already in many areas of the world: this is also the area where extra governments budgetary provisions ought to go.
Wars are cancers of our humanity. Places in which wars develop are areas of special need and understanding. Often wars could be avoided by ensuring that the hawks of self-interest of the military or the ideologues or dictators are guaranteed their place in the sun at the United Nations Assembly. Here is the place where intervention for the solution of problems should occur. The movement of people from one country to another is an on-going reality that needs to be faced. This should not be regarded as a political football within the national boundaries of a nation. The real politics should be played with our regional political colleagues in all of our neighbouring nation states.
Tom Padula – October 2011
