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Court demands
forced U-turns for illegal immigrants
Western Australia's
Premier Richard Court wants a tougher approach to the issue of illegal
immigrants.
Mr Court says authorities should track down large boat
loads of immigrants and turn them around before they reach Australian
shores.
Immigration Minister Philip Ruddock says intelligence
information shows large groups of people are gathering in Indonesia,
preparing to make the journey to Australia.
He says efforts are
underway to stop them before they leave.
But Mr Court says even if
the boat people begin their journey to Australia, they should be stopped
before they arrive.
"If it's true that there are a large number on
a single boat, we should send an even larger boat, turn them around and
put them back into the port where they come from," he said.
Mr
Court says illegal immigrants take a punt that Australia's sense of fair
play gives them a fifty-fifty chance of staying in the country.
He
says it is a rort and Australia must toughen its approach to the
issue.
Christmas Island
Meanwhile, the president
of the Chamber of Commerce on Christmas Island, Philip Oakley, says there
is no way the island can cope with another large influx of boat
people.
In the past few months, Christmas Island has been a popular
destination for boat people attempting to enter Australia.
Mr
Oakley says catering for 1,000 boat people, which could be heading for
Australia in one group, is way beyond the island's resources.
"If
we were to get anything like 1,000 people on this island at once we would
have a major logistical problem," he said.
"In the past we've had
up to about 300 illegal immigrants at any one point in time and that
stretches resources to the absolute maximum."
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