New Leaks Threaten Human Smuggling Talks and Lead To Hack Attacks On Australia 304
cold fjord writes "Indonesia is threatening to cease cooperation with Australia on human smuggling as a result of further Snowden leaks published by the Guardian and other papers over the weekend. The leaks involve reported use of Australian embassies across Asia for signals intelligence as well as reports of intelligence operations by Australia and the U.S. in 2007 at the U.N. climate change conference in Bali. (In 2002 a terrorist attack at the Sari club in Bali killed 240 people, including 88 Australians.) As a result of the revelations, various groups are reportedly taking revenge, including claimed or alleged involvement of the Java Cyber Army, members of Anonymous in Indonesia, and possibly other hacker groups. They are attacking hundreds of Australian websites. Among the reported victims are Queensland hospital, a children's cancer association an anti-slavery charity, and many more."
Not the leaks (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not the leaks that threaten these talks. It's the espionage that threatens the talks.
Re:Not the leaks (Score:5, Insightful)
It's the clear strategy of the governments involved to blame the leaks for causing the problems. Failure to give the government a pass on the grounds that it "should have remained secret" makes you a terrorist.
Re: (Score:2)
And they have plenty of mouthpieces and jingoists to spread such misinformation and propaganda. People like cold fjord are the real traitors of the people not Snowden.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The person who submitted this propaganda piece.
Re: (Score:2)
Not to mention his silly "think of the children!!" part at the end.
Re: Not the leaks (Score:5, Insightful)
Spying on US citizens isn't a disease, it is merely a symptom of the disease. Spying on allied governments is another symptom. Spying on neutral governments is another symptom. Spying on citizens of other nations is yet another symptom.
The actual disease is, the desire to know everything, and hence, to control everything.
When you understand what the NSA's goals are, then you begin to understand how much is wrong. When a doctor learns that a patient has sneezes and sniffles, he doesn't stop there to treat the sneezes and the sniffles. He attempts to learn whether the patient has any more symptoms, then he attempts to make a diagnosis. Prism is just one of many symptoms that go into diagnosing the real problem.
Re: Not the leaks (Score:5, Insightful)
The Disease is the PATRIOT act. and none of you are demanding to your congress critter to repeal it. Or telling everyone you know how it's what allows them to do this and more and getting other riles up about PATRIOT.
That is the answer to fix all of it. Yet everyone here wants to piss in the same bowl of cheerios instead of actually doing anything.
Get off your asses, spread the word and start writing letters.
Re: (Score:3)
The Disease is the PATRIOT act...
No, that's another symptom.
The disease is a far too large & powerful US Federal government that barely even pays lip-service to the Constitution and it's limits on government powers, if it's not outright publicly and blatantly mocked by those in office.
Large enough to build such a hugely expensive monstrosity, too powerful to be stopped by laws or Constitutional limitations, and able to use it's data to destroy anyone, including politicians supposedly in oversight, that don't "play along".
It's Big Broth
Re: (Score:3)
No the problem is US populations cowardice, where it has allowed itself to be terrorised that allowed this to happen, quite ironic even with all those guns.
No, the problem is not one of cowardice. Remember "Let's roll"? The many stories of bravery by 9/11 emergency responders? All the stunning examples of bravery and sacrifice by our young soldiers?
The problem is the results of a longterm program of propaganda and subversion, destruction of the family unit, destruction of pillars of common moral underpinnings, indoctrination-instead-of-education systems, and other attacks designed to divide, destabilize, encourage illiteracy & ignorance of history, and dis
Re: Not the leaks (Score:4, Insightful)
I think that they will need to repeal a lot more than just the Patriot Act at this point. Besides, it is not like operating outside the law has detered these organizations in the past. The only solution is to accept that no government office should be above scrutiny.
Re: (Score:3)
Repealing the patriot act will rip out it's teeth and spine. Everything passed after it relied on what damage it did.
Re: (Score:3)
The gun isn't composed of sentient beings who exercise free will. The NSA is composed of such beings. Further, those sentient beings make routine requests for funding, continually growing their strength and their abilities. More, the gun doesn't deceive the wielder, keeping information secret, while offering disinformation in testimony and public press releases.
You analogy simply sucks. The NSA is not an inanimate object, nor are the people who work for the NSA.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Not the leaks (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not the leaks that threaten these talks. It's the espionage that threatens the talks.
No shit; I mean, what kind of jingoist, fascist asshole blames the guy who risked his ass to bring the evil deeds of clandestine criminal groups into the sunlight?
*looks at submitter name in summary*
Ah, that kind.
Re:Not the leaks (Score:5, Insightful)
I mean, what kind of jingoist, fascist asshole blames the guy who risked his ass to bring the evil deeds of clandestine criminal groups into the sunlight?
So you disagree with my stand opposing human smuggling and trafficking, the hacking of hospitals, anti-slavery charities, and other NGOs, not to mention opposing the killing by the hundreds of innocent tourists having a nice vacation?
That weak attempt to discredit someone by claiming they support policies that no rational person would ever support is the best response you can come up with? Shit, I know middle-schoolers with better game.
And FTR, no, I disagree with your insistence to suck fed cock by laying the blame for their crimes one the one dude who had the fucking hojo's to call them out on it. A point which is likely glaringly obvious to everyone on the planet other than you.
Re: (Score:2)
That weak attempt to discredit someone by claiming they support policies that no rational person would ever support
Those policies or practices are obviously supported by somebody otherwise they wouldn't be happening.
I disagree with your insistence to suck fed cock by
I support no such thing.
laying the blame for their crimes one the one dude
He was able to commit crimes of his own.
Re: (Score:2)
Those policies or practices are obviously supported by somebody otherwise they wouldn't be happening.
Sure, but not by a rational person let alone the person you responded to.
I support no such thing.
Your posts say otherwise, shill.
He was able to commit crimes of his own.
His "crime" is no worse than the people who broke segregation laws, etc. Sometimes laws are not just or correct and deserve to be broken for the benefit of the people. Whereas traitors like yourself will justify any misdeed of the government.
Re:Not the leaks (Score:4, Insightful)
Your stand encourages human smuggling and trafficking. The less we know about espionage, the more of it will happen. The more espionage that happens, the less international cooperation there will be. The less international cooperation there is, the more human smuggling and trafficking there will be.
Re: (Score:2)
You have it backwards. Intelligence operations by the police and security agencies are often important sources for the intelligence necessary to enforce the law and stop human smuggling and trafficking.
Re: (Score:2)
Extraordinary rendition is human smuggling and trafficking (not to mention that said trafficking is also used to enable another crime: torture), and it is conducted by those very same "police and security agencies" that you so vehemently defend - and they would very much prefer to do that in secret so that the public doesn't ask any inconvenient questions.
Re: (Score:3)
I'm pretty certain that neither the Australian Signals Directorate nor the NSA engages in any sort of rendition, and they seem to be part of the topic here.
Re:Not the leaks (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm pretty certain that neither the Australian Signals Directorate nor the NSA engages in any sort of rendition
How exactly would you know, if everything is secret, and any potentially illegal activity such as rendition is only vetted by an internal secret court?
As far as NSA goes, I think it's practically a certainty that they have engaged in such practices, since we know for sure that CIA does that. They might not be doing it themselves directly, but rather handing off the names to CIA to reuse the existing infrastructure. If you want to bicker about terminology, okay, so that would be aiding and abetting human trafficking, not human trafficking per se. Big fucking difference.
In any case, you did not refer to NSA to ASD, but to "police and security agencies" in general. And the thing about this scandal is that, while NSA has been the main target so far, they all benefit from this cloud of secrecy to hide away any clear wrongdoings as well as generally questionable activity.
It's about reality not lies (Score:2)
So it's not about standing against all that is good, it is just about pointing
Re: (Score:3)
It's not the leaks that threaten these talks. It's the espionage that threatens the talks.
I think the more shocking aspect is how much collusion there is with the espionage, not the espionage itself. It's as if there is no separation between the US, UK, Australia, Italy, and Germany intelligence agencies.
People have been telling about a group trying to create a new world government right under your noses. Not just those "wacky" people like Alex Jones and Gary Allen, but Presidents Kennedy and Eisenhower said the same thing. If you look at the collusion here suddenly all those "wacko conspirac
Re: (Score:2)
the more shocking aspect is how much collusion there is with the espionage, not the espionage itself. It's as if there is no separation between the US, UK, Australia, Italy, and Germany intelligence agencies.
WWII, Cold War, NATO, ANZUS, etc. ECHELON [wikipedia.org] was built in the early 60's, and public knowledge by the late 80's.
People have been telling about a group trying to create a new world government right under your noses ... Presidents Kennedy and Eisenhower said the same thing.
Cite or quotation?
Re:Not the leaks (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:3)
Ike was talking about the American defense industry and how congress fed it. JFK was talking about worldwide communism. Arguably the latter was intended to be a "a new world government", but given that we won the Cold War two decades ago, I doubt that's what the GGP was talking about.
Re: (Score:3)
The Presidential speeches reference many topics and a main topic. To claim that they don't contain what is written and stated because it's not of the topic you believe to be the main topic is illogical and irrational.
Further, to claim these guys didn't know what they were writing or saying is also illogical and irrational. These guys spend a lot of time writing and practicing speeches, they have professionals that help them write them, and there is tremendous study of every statement through Philosophical
Re: (Score:2)
Keep telling yourself that 9/11 "truther" if it makes you feel better. How many people would have had to be murdered to cover up your fake crash into the pentagon again? What about that building you keep saying should never have burned so the "guvvamint done it". You are still just a wacko pretending to be important by attaching the title HR gave you to your posts.
Another thing, Kennedy lied about the missile gap - truly a massive lie - maybe t
Re: (Score:3)
It's not the leaks that threaten these talks. It's the espionage that threatens the talks.
The "threat" is that these talks will be delayed by a month, while the diplomats put on their "we're so outraged" show, and a few script kiddies hit Australia. These revelations are about as surprising as finding out that the sun rises in the east. It's become comical. Brazil express outrage, oops, Brazil is doing it too (and it's hardly limited to Brazil). The diplomatic protests are just kabuki.
What outrages me is the domestic spying, including loopholes like comm between two US parties being routed outs
Re:Not the leaks (Score:5, Informative)
I'm curious why Snowden is doing this now. The domestic revelations were very important, and I thank him for them. These foreign revelations are another story. I doubt they do any harm, or at least no more than finding out that the sun rises in the east. But why? Does he think these are a big deal? Does he just want revenge? Or (one to be hoped for) he just wants to keep making noise about the NSA until something is done about the domestic situation. Inquiring minds want to know.
I think it's worth remembering that ever since (or prior to) Russia granted Snowden's request for asylum, the press has been in control of the manner in which Snowden's material is published. No new leaks (by Snowden) was a condition of Russia's for granting his request for asylum.
Re: (Score:2)
Didn't realize that - thanks.
Re: (Score:3)
It's not the leaks that threaten these talks. It's the espionage that threatens the talks.
Actually NEITHER threaten the talks. Indonesia should be interested in their citizens not being enslaved even if the person offering to help them spied of them.
It's like refusing the fire fighter's help while your house is on fire because you don't like the current mayor. You're mostly just spiting yourself.
As to indignation. They can give us a break. Every country spies on pretty much every other country. If Indonesia's intelligence agency isn't spying on Australia... it's not for lack of effort I'm
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
As far as I can tell, no religious supremicist organisations in Australia had publicly threatened to kill visiting Indonesians. If they did, Australia's government would "spy" on them for the Indonesians. Indonesia's Islamo-fascist citizens threaten to kill Australians and Australia wants to know if their threats are going to be followed through. Also they want to know If they are sponsored by elements of the Indonesian government. The espionage is justified.
Because every general and his aide in Indone
Re: (Score:2)
It's not the leaks that threaten these talks. It's the espionage that threatens the talks.
So if you told a drug-kingpin that one of his dealers was talking to the cops, you'd have nothing to do with the dealer's murder (and the subsequent end of the police investigation)?
Legally speaking you'd probably be fine. For the murder. There might be conspiracy charges, or obstruction charges, tho.
The thing I hate about groups like Wikileaks isn't what they do in principle. It's that, in practice, they almost never discriminate between reasonable secrecy and unreasonable secrecy. In this case the US isn'
Re: (Score:3)
It's not the leaks that threaten these talks. It's the espionage that threatens the talks.
Yes, it really is the leaks. The Indonesian security services and government would have known of this all along. Australia and Indonesia have never had the coziest relationship. We've been shooting at each other in Borneo, new Guinea and Timor, which neither side wanted to publicise.
But with the leaks, the Indonesians have to be "shocked, shocked I tell you" for internal political reasons.
And they would have to start cooperating with Australia before they could stop.
Re:Not the leaks (Score:5, Insightful)
No, it's clearly the new of the leaks that did it. Last week there wasn't a diplomatic crisis, then the leaks came, and now there is a diplomatic crisis.
Quiet diplomacy is only possible when confidentiality is possible.
This just in: mass surveillance of your "allies" pisses them off!
There will probably be more human smuggling and trafficking due to Snowden.
Hahaha! Good old cold fjord. Yeah, it wasn't the fault of the people doing the spying it was Snowden's!! Yeah just like it was the fault of the woman being raped because she wasn't dressed in a burqa not that of the rapist, right?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Who told Indonesia they're a US ally? I'm quite serious here, every statement I've seen from Obama on the country where he grew up avoids that word very carefully.
They're a friendly state, and "allied" in the sense that we help each-other achieve certain fairly important tactical goals, but we've got 42 actual Allies. These are countries we are treaty-bound to die for under certain circumstances. In simple practical terms releasing the information that we spy in Indonesia shouldn't surprise anyone. The enti
Re: (Score:3)
Public knowledge of mass surveillance of your "allies" pisses them off!
It's probable that the government of the day largely shares Interests with its allies, it is less likely the opposition parties are just as supportive of those same Interests.
I guess a classic example would be American support for the IRA not really popular with its British Allies an obvious conflict of interest.. I can't imagine why America wouldn't be carrying out surveillance within the UK. American Interests such as Cruise missiles
Re: (Score:3)
I think those modding down cold fjord might be overlooking some things. There is the backroom persona for politicians and there is the press room persona. Indonesian politicians are not stupid, and being not stupid they should know, even without evidence, that countries whose interests intersect with theirs, whether supportive or adversarial, will conduct espionage. They also should know that their base of power comes from a fickle and often nationalistic public whose eyes are always on them.
If we assume th
Re:Not the leaks (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
It isn't human trafficking, it is human smuggling. The human smuggling is already occurring, it isn't occurring because of the leaks. The leaks have created diplomatic problems that are likely to prevent effective intervention against the smuggling.
It would be gratifying if you could bother to get it right.
Re: (Score:2)
The leaks have created diplomatic problems that are likely to prevent effective intervention against the smuggling.
No, spying on them caused the diplomatic issues. It would have caused diplomatic issues no matter how they found out about it.
Re: (Score:3)
The leaks have created diplomatic problems that are likely to prevent effective intervention against the smuggling.
That is still a false dilemma! Did Australia claim that they will no longer prosecute or investigate human trafficking in Australia? (smuggling is a different term for the same thing, don't bother trying to "straw man" the terminology.) Did any other country, including Indonesia, claim that they would no longer investigate or prosecute human trafficking based on the leaks in their own country? The answer to both of those questions is "NO".
Are you going to somehow claim that Australia can no longer patro
Indonesia (Score:2, Interesting)
The leaks have created diplomatic problems that are likely to prevent effective intervention against the smuggling.
Dear Mr. Cold Fjord,
This is INDONESIA that we are talking about.
For years (actually, decades) Indonesia never took the issue human trafficking/smuggling seriously. Whether it be human trafficking/smuggling to Australia, to Singapore, to Malaysia, or to any other place in the world.
Indonesia is a nation which has too many people living on too many island, and the corrupt regime (whether or not it was under Suhartoe or the current one) never place that issue as a top priority.
Furthermore, Indonesia, as th
Re:Not the leaks (Score:5, Insightful)
No, it's clearly the new of the leaks that did it. Last week there wasn't a diplomatic crisis, then the leaks came, and now there is a diplomatic crisis.
Yes, and when your wife finds out that you're cheating on her, it's not your fault for cheating but her fault for finding out. Do you really not see anything wrong with that reasoning?
Quiet diplomacy is only possible when confidentiality is possible.
Trust, but verify.
There will probably be more human smuggling and trafficking due to Snowden.
No, blame falls entirely on the bad behavior of the Australian Signals Directorate and their lack of trustworthyness.
Re:Not the leaks (Score:5, Insightful)
No, blame falls entirely on the bad behavior of the Australian Signals Directorate and their lack of trustworthyness.
I don't think we should blame the intelligence agencies for this. You don't install sophisticated interception equipment hidden in architectural features of embassies all over the region, and operate them possibly for decades, without a fair amount of cooperation between branches of the government. The intelligence services did what they were told to do, and in that respect, were plenty trustworthy.
Back home, we can't really argue that the NSA was out-of-bounds. We elected officials, they passed laws, they appointed secret judges, they signed secret executive orders, and the agencies did everything within their power to gather intelligence that would help us or protect us. Citizens allowed this to happen (in theory -- assumes civilians are in-the-know), and I see the logic that would lead someone to try to get civilian attention with vandalism on charities and whatnot.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
You're both wrong. The people to blame for human trafficking are the human traffickers.
The human traffickers are just providing a service for a fee. The real blame should go to legislatures that criminalize the free movement of people.
Re: (Score:2)
But didn't you just publicly leak the fact that Snowden leaked information?
Clearly that means the blame for the original crimes falls squarely on your shoulders.
Not only that, but you are trying to implicate ME in your crimes by making me point out that you are pointing out what Snowden has already pointed out!
Damn you, now you're even more guilty!
Saved by sliding grovel last time (Score:2)
If the Indonesians play this well they can use it to get a great deal of advantage with a not yet functioning new Australian government that needs Indonesian support to deliver their main promise to the Australian voters. However this new thing is really just a minor aftershock related to the real diplomatic crisis a month or two a
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
No, what caused harm was the act that was committed not that it was exposed. Stop being an asshat. There would have been no harm at all if the spying had not been done in the first place.
Re: (Score:2)
The "western presence in Indonesia" does nothing to stop human trafficking. The Australian human traficking agreement is about Australia trafficking refugees that turn up on their shores to Indonesia where they can be mistreated without so much scrutiny, in exchange for aid money.
Re: (Score:2)
Let me fix this for you.
Who would benefit from the lack of a Western presence in Indonesia to counter human trafficking (and the terrorism that comes with it)? It wouldn't be ordinary Australian, Indonesian, or American citizens, but would be human traffickers and terrorists that benefit from a lack of oversight. By asking the question "cui bono?", illegal pervasive surveillance can be proven to be harmful to ordinary people - in at least this case.
Re: (Score:2)
[I]f you gave half a shit you would google it yourself.
Protip: I found them by googling [...]
I give a shit, but I use a web search site that isn't provided by a repeat-violator of privacy laws, and a known NSA/GCHQ-collaborator. They exist — you just need to give a shit about your privacy*: https://prism-break.org/#en [prism-break.org] (See under "Web search.")
* Maybe you don't give a shit... I don't know — I'm just letting you know that there are less-intrusive alternatives.
Re: (Score:2)
I think it's funny that the government thinks it's OK to take our information, but when we get to see their information, they cry like a five year old with a skinned knee.
Apparently you aren't aware that governments almost universally have powers that ordinary individual citizens don't. Government generally have a monopoly on the legal use of force. They are generally the only ones able to imprison you, or tax you, or formally arrest you, or legally remove your liberty by sending you to prison, and many other powers. By nature of their powers they are often in possession of considerable amounts of confidential information that they have a duty to keep confidential, such a
Re: (Score:2)
By nature of their powers they are often in possession of considerable amounts of confidential information that they have a duty to keep confidential
I guess that is why Snowden went to work for the private sector then (BAH) - to get access to considerable amounts of confidential information...
That is before you get to the question of confidential intelligence information necessary to perform industrial espionage profitably [startpage.com]. FTFY
It is really quite odd that you fail to recognize that. Do you simply think of the private military industrial complex [wikipedia.org] as your playmate?
Re: (Score:2)
That's funny, he actually does try to justify it a few posts down. You beat him to it in fewer words.
Re: (Score:2)
So what justification do I use?
Re: (Score:2)
woosh...
I do like how you completely distorted the subject of the article and turned it into an anti-snowden rant.
Re: (Score:2)
Please, show me the quote in this forum.
Re: (Score:2)
>"But everyone does it!!"
I don't.
Indiustrial Espionage contributes to smuggling (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Indiustrial Espionage contributes to smuggling (Score:5, Informative)
It is *not* illegal to enter Australia via any means to seek asylum, despite what so many of our politicians say. There are zero "illegal asylum seekers".
Asylum seekers may well perform illegal acts or use illegal services to get to Australia, but the actual act of coming to Australia to seek asylum is not illegal, whether they come by boat, plane or walk across the ocean floor.
They may be determined not to be asylum seekers, in which case their continued residence in Australia may be determined to be illegal, but that is separate from the act of coming to Australia to seek asylum.
Re:Indiustrial Espionage contributes to smuggling (Score:4, Informative)
It is *not* illegal to enter Australia via any means to seek asylum, despite what so many of our politicians say. There are zero "illegal asylum seekers".
Asylum seekers may well perform illegal acts or use illegal services to get to Australia, but the actual act of coming to Australia to seek asylum is not illegal, whether they come by boat, plane or walk across the ocean floor.
They may be determined not to be asylum seekers, in which case their continued residence in Australia may be determined to be illegal, but that is separate from the act of coming to Australia to seek asylum.
Correct! And there are far more people illegally overstaying tourist and other visas than there are asylum seekers risking their lives in unsafe boats to legally flee persecution.
Re: (Score:3)
Sadly a majority of the population seems to have drunk the 'illegal immigrant' kool aide from the current (and former) Government. Maybe if the refugees called it 'defecting' it would be sexier.
Re: (Score:2)
When you can't disprove what someone says you simply assassinate their character by lumping them in with pedophiles, terrorists, smugglers, etc. and claim that the discredited person is providing them aid.
... in other words ... (Score:2)
When you can't disprove what someone says you simply assassinate their character by lumping them in with pedophiles, terrorists, smugglers, etc. and claim that the discredited person is providing them aid.
Ain't that the definition of Ad Hominem ?
Re: (Score:2)
When you can't disprove what someone says you simply assassinate their character
You do seem to use that strategy a lot.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
In your case Cold Fjord, character assassination is not needed, you do it so well yourself by your posts, which are becoming an amusing cliche's to everyone these days.
Re: (Score:3)
"But everyone does it!!"
-cold fjord justifying any action of the US Government's surveillance programs
You know. When I was young we Americans used to pride ourselves on our moral values. We would talk about the atrocities of war and were proud that the U.S. didn't do that. When I was in the Peace Corps in Africa, we would say how glad we were as Americans that we don't have to bribe officials at customs to get our bags through. We don't have cops stopping cars because they wanted bribes. Those were things that others did but we were better than that. Well, other countries may spy on all their citizens and r
Headline fail. (Score:5, Insightful)
"Indonesia is threatening to cease cooperation with Australia on human smuggling as a result of further Snowden leaks
... Soo, Indonesia was previously helping Australia with their human smuggling operation? In either event, what does having your corrupt officials mismanaging things have to do with ceasing humanitarian endeavors? This is like saying "After we got busted doing evil things, we're going to just go all in on that whole evil thing, while insisting that you spying on us doing our evil things is wrong and you should stop."
Re:Headline fail. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
The people smuggling trade brings a lot of money into Indonesia; buying boats, bribing police and officials. Cutting it off is going to annoy quite a lot of people.
So the NSA has been sitting on intelligence reports that people are being sold into slavery... and of course dutifully passed this on to the appropriate government agencies who... proceeded to do nothing. And yet the story here is "teh nsa iz evilz!"
Re: (Score:2)
There's no slavery involved. In this case "people smuggling" refers to offering passage by sea from Indonesia to Australia to desperate asylum seekers. No-one wants these people. Indonesia doesn't want them adding to the population, and Australia demonises them because it makes good politics to play up to xenophobia. The spying probably has nothing to do with the people smuggling at all, it's just being another excuse not to play ball with the new Australian prime minster Tony Abbott, who has already be
Re:Headline fail. (Score:5, Interesting)
It's not slavery, it's basically illegal migration by claiming to be a refugee. Rather than engage in the orderly process of getting a visa by getting approval of refugee status from the UN, they decide to go to Indonesia, pay a "people smuggler" who will organise things to get them into Australian waters, then ring some government department to send the navy to go pick them up because their little dingy is probably going to sink soon. Before getting picked up, they discard all their identification papers. Once being processed, they claim they're refugees, escaping persecution, ignoring the fact that they would have passed through four or five different countries who aren't persecuting them.
If they were neighbouring countries, it would be a different matter, but because they're travelling to Australia, I don't think a lot of them are genuine refugees, after all, they're not being persecuted in Indonesia. It's quite a terrible joke what the people smugglers do. If you look on a map to see where 'Christmas Island" is, in relation to Indonesia, you will see why they do it; because it's not ridiculously far from Indonesia and once in Australian waters, our government is compelled to do something. Unlike the US-Mexican border, where many people try to get into the USA and evade detection, in our case, there is absolutely no compulsion to avoid detection, they actually want to be picked up and processed, that way they can get legal entitlements (read: welfare).
Australia is a well-to-do country, and, while some of the immigrants will be escaping some form of persecution worthy of resettlement, a lot of them are economic migrants who are arriving by boat to avoid having to go through the proper, overly bureaucratic procedures. This is unfair to the people who haven't got the money to pay a smuggler. Apparently it's in the vicinity of ~$AU10,000 that people smugglers charge. It's not an insignificant sum of money.
With that brief background, my opinion is that the bribing, and general expenses around people smuggling, means that a lot of that cost is parked in the Indonesian economy. A few thousand Australian dollars is a huge amount in Indonesia, considering their largest currency denomination is worth about $AU10. I just get the feeling that the diplomatic problem is that they know it's happening, they know it's wrong, but they're on the beneficiary side to it, so they don't want it to change.
The NSA has very little to do with this. It's a broader issue with two countries playing politics and politicians trying to win elections. There's that underlying sentiment of the public, and politicians will generally play to nationalistic tendencies, to appear strong. It happened here, and the Indonesians, with an impending election, are doing same.
Re: (Score:3)
I too, have a suspicion that many of the asylum seekers are simply economic migrants. However I'm sure you've heard the counter-arguments;
- The neighbouring countries they pass through are not signatories to the UN convention on refugees
- They are certainly poorly treated (often gaoled) in Indonesia
- Extended families often pool their money to come up with the $10k to send one member
- 90% of asylum seekers (who arrive by boat) are found to be legitimate refugees by Australia
- The chances of being resett
Re: (Score:2)
Oh, wait, that's the OTHER Java (Score:2)
-Wait, you mean the other Java, don't you.
Yeah, ok, that makes more sense.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Scary headline is disingenuous (Score:5, Informative)
From TFA:
When he was questioned about what action Indonesia would take against Australia, the foreign minister [Dr. Marty Natalegawa] said: “One of them obviously is the agreement to exchange information, exchange even intelligence information, in fact, to address the issue of people smuggling."
Basically, Indonesia is leveraging the disclosures to force Australia to agree to exchange intelligence information to address the problem of human trafficking. Nowhere in the TFA says that Indonesia is going to cancel the talks with Australia over this. Australia broke the trust, its up to them to fix it.
Comment removed (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Consider it a stress test. Maybe Australia should even pay them for it.
Well one problem almost solved (Score:2)
Here in the US, we've been watching our constitutional freedoms infringed increasingly. I don't like to say "eroded" or "removed" because the constitution doesn't guarantee our freedoms so much as it prohibits the government from infringing on them. So let's always keep in mind what the constitution was written to do. Our freedoms are declared and government is limited. They are breaking the constitution. That's the short of it. And at the moment, we're not seeing anything suggesting they are going to
Indonesia, corrupt and incapable. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Hey, give Anonymous some credit here! At least they're going after Canberra this time and not Vienna!
Re: (Score:2)
Queensland isn't Canberra. Frankly I'm surprised they didn't miss and hit New Zealand with accuracy like that.
Re: (Score:2)
>Guy Fawkes' Day.
You mean 'Bonfire Night'.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonfire_Night [wikipedia.org]
Re: (Score:2)
I notice that the UK media tends to refer to it as "Bonfire Night". That is merely for political correctness, because historically it was an anti-Catholic night. Guy Fawkes was part of a Catholic plot to assassinate King James I, and it is his effigy- the "Guy" - that is burned on the bonfire.
Re: (Score:2)
As I remember from spending the first 30 years of my life living in Britain, it was, and still is called Bonfire Night by British people in Britain. The Guy Fawkes thing is British history and anti-Catholicism has pretty much nothing to do with the sentiment of the occasion across the whole of Britain, excepting some communities in Northern Ireland, where the Protestant/Catholic thing is still an issue.
As with every other country, there is a day where people let fireworks off and set fire to things. In the
Politics, not Snowden, and "human smuggling" (Score:3)
It should be noted that 'people smuggling' isn't related to slavery; it's the politicised term for the people who help refugees get to Autralia. The efforts to stop people smugglers are about the current Australian government's (xenophobic) anti-refugee policies; they're the result of domestic politics, not a cooperative effort to stop human trafficking.
It's not actually xenophobia when you attempt to enforce your national borders.
The situation between Indonesia and Australia is similar to the situation between Mexico and the U.S., where the Mexican government in some cases actually busses illegals to the U.S. border in order to aid their illegal immigartion into the U.S.. While most illegals are economic refugees, the bussing mostly involved "undesirables" in Mexico, which included Mexican criminals, but more frequently were refugees from Guatamala and E
Re: (Score:2)
'people smuggling' isn't related to slavery; it's the politicised term for the people who help refugees get to Autralia. [It's] about the current Australian government's (xenophobic) anti-refugee policies
Cryst, you are naive.
Human trafficking is mostly about gullible girls being promised good jobs in more prosperous countries but actually being forced into prostitution. They may well be told to claim to be refugees, as also do adventurers who know that this is an almost sure passport to anywhere they want to go, thanks to the existence of so many gullible people like you who believe the bullshit.
Link [humantrafficking.org]
Why the Indonesian government should be content to see so much of their best womanho
Re: (Score:2)
Human trafficking and human smuggling are two different things. By definition, the latter is about people who want to go, and who are not being tricked into prostitution or something. Along the US-Mexican border the human smugglers are called coyotes. It's a standard service that's available.
Re: (Score:2)
Unlike human trafficking, people smuggling is characterized by the consent between customer and smuggler - a contractual agreement that typically terminates upon arrival in the destination location. [wikipedia.org]
Re: (Score:2)
There is no heroic position in providing information that *will* help terrorists.
Any terrorist who was too dumb to realize that this sort of spying was probably going on, is too dumb to worry about.
Re: (Score:2)
Yes. The people who are ACTUALLY doing the dirty deeds are not responsible. The guy with the flashlight showing the world the truth is the real problem. Taking sides in an issue is not justification for military action. If you believe that then you must also believe that Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor is justified because the US was providing weapons to France which was affecting Japan's campaign during WW2 prior to the US's direct involvement. Please don't tell me those are two very different things.
Re: (Score:2)
There is no heroic position in providing information that *will* help terrorists.
Publishing a book on electric engineering will help terrorists (they will use it to make bombs). So what? Terrorists are so minor a threat in the grand scheme of things that constantly looking at what can potentially benefit them as a side effect is a very stupid waste of one's time. The important part about Snowden's revelations is that it helps the citizens of all these countries to make their governments truly accountable to them.
Re: (Score:2)
Note the name of the submitter of the article. That's really all you need to know to form an opinion on it.
Re: (Score:3)
There is no "fallout from the actions of Snowden and the Guardian". There is fallout from the actions of the Australian intelligence services. It is, indeed, pretty straightforward.