Remember Reza Barati - Welcome Refugees

February 17th marks four years since Reza Barati was murdered in detention. Reza was a 23-year-old Iranian refugee seeking asylum but Australian border policy meant he was detained on Manus Island in an Australian run detention centre. On February 17, 2014, he was murdered.



For several weeks in early 2014, asylum seekers detained in the
Manus Island Regional Processing Centre had been protesting against
their treatment. They said that physical and verbal abuse by security
guards (from Australian company G4S) was common place. Tensions rose
when on 14 February, the refugees were told of Australia’s new
policy to not allow anyone who had arrived by boat to settle in
Australia.



On 17 February the camp was attacked and Reza Barati was murdered. An inquiry found he was hit with a piece
of timber with a nail sticking out, before he was bashed with a large
rock on his head. G4S security guards (who were there to guard the camp)
participated in the attack.



On Manus and Nauru, another Australian off-shore detention centre, other asylum seekers have died, and people will continue to die and suffer until refugees are welcomed rather than detained.



The Freedom Shop does have some zines and leaflets about Manus, Nauru and Australia's border policy. We also have books about borders, asylum seekers and refugees and their struggles to seek asylum, including:





Aminullah



More Tales of Migration






Undocumented



The Architecture of Migrant Detention






Violent Borders



Refugees and the Right to Move






Undoing Border Imperialism



     




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