Australian Refugee Visa Processing to be Speeded Up

Added by National Visas on November 2, 2011
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Processing for visa Australian for Refugee to be expedited! Just recently, an announcement was made by the Australian Minister for Immigration and Citizenship regarding its effort on speeding up the Australian visa form processing arrangements ahead of the move to community detention.

Under the Australian Government’s new approach to immigration detention through a better cooperation between the immigration and security agencies, the security assessments and Australia visa form processing for prospective holders of a refugee visa to Australia will be accelerated.

With Australia’s Refugee and Humanitarian Program, one of the two components of Australia’s Immigration Program, the Australian government will provide protection for asylum seekers who meet the United Nations definition of a refugee, as defined in the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees and its 1967 Protocol (Refugees Convention).

These refugees (who are already in Australia) and others in refugee–like situations (outside Australia) will be offered protection and resettlement by the Australian Government.

For refugees who are in Australia and wish to apply for protection or asylum, under the onshore component of the Refugee and Humanitarian program, they can apply visa to Australia under only one available visa subclass, the Protection Visa (Class XA) (Subclass 866). While under the offshore component of the Refugee and Humanitarian Program, there are two categories of people who can apply: the Refugee category for people subject to persecution in their home country and the Special Humanitarian Program (SHP) category for people who, while not being refugees, are subject to substantial discrimination amounting to a gross violation of their human rights in their home country.

Under the Australia’s Refugee and Humanitarian Program, in order to be granted visas Australian, these refugees must first pass the Australian visa requirements like character and security checks, required health examinations and sign the Australian Values Statement.

According to Australian Immigration Minister Chris Bowen, between the Department of Immigration and Citizenship (DIAC) and the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), Australia’s national security service, they have significantly sped up the processing of the vast majority of refugee claims and their security claims.

For the last 12 months, 3,900 visas were already granted to people who’ve arrived by boat as compared to the 2,600 that have arrived. For the first time, DIAC have been releasing more people from detention as compared to the number of people who are going into detention.

This combined effort of speeding up humanitarian Australia visa processing times comes as Australia makes community detention a more central part of the immigration system.

Earlier this month, Prime Minister Julian Gillard was forced to dump a controversial refugee-swap deal with Malaysia for lack of support. Consequently, the Australian Government had announced that since the Malaysia refugee swap deal was rejected by the Federal Parliament, asylum applicants on Australian soil will now be housed in the community on bridging visas, allowing them to work and live un-detained while their refugee claims are assessed and heard by the appropriate (Australian) authorities.

The Malaysia refugee swap deal was a plan where the Australian government will be able to send 800 asylum seekers to Malaysia for “processing” and accept 4,000 already “processed” refugees from Malaysia. This swap deal is said to deter would-be asylum seekers from the dangerous journey — usually by leaky, overcrowded boat, provided by Indonesian “snake-heads,” or people smugglers — to Australia.

However, Mr. Bowen also made it clear that there will also be some cases where security and other concerns will lead to much longer processing times.

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