http://www.lankaweb.com/news/items/2009/10/31/bogus-tamil-asylum-seekers-and-people-smugglers/ Lankaweb.com Thu, 18 Mar 2010 20:41:08 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 http://www.lankaweb.com/news/items/2009/10/31/bogus-tamil-asylum-seekers-and-people-smugglers/comment-page-1/#comment-729 cassandra Sat, 31 Oct 2009 12:34:18 +0000 http://www.lankaweb.com/news/items/?p=5097#comment-729 One cannot help feeling that the predicament in which Australia finds itself in respect of the asylum seekers from Sri Lanka, is, at least in part, a problem of her own making. For reasons best known to the Australian government, it could not bring itself to proscribe the LTTE, despite the fact that various Australian allies in the west had already done so. And so the message sent to would be asylum seekers from SL has been been a 'weak' one and one that was encouraging to them - not designed to discourage them. Perhaps, even belatedly, the Rudd government should realise that it cannot afford to be 'wishy washy' when it comes to matters like recognising terrorist groups for what they are. One cannot help feeling that the predicament in which Australia finds itself in respect of the asylum seekers from Sri Lanka, is, at least in part, a problem of her own making. For reasons best known to the Australian government, it could not bring itself to proscribe the LTTE, despite the fact that various Australian allies in the west had already done so. And so the message sent to would be asylum seekers from SL has been been a ‘weak’ one and one that was encouraging to them – not designed to discourage them. Perhaps, even belatedly, the Rudd government should realise that it cannot afford to be ‘wishy washy’ when it comes to matters like recognising terrorist groups for what they are.

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