SYDNEY: Delays in repatriating Lebanese-Australians from Lebanon showed Canberra was not only pandering to Israel but exhibiting racism towards people of Arabic decent, a prominent Australian Muslim said yesterday.
Keyser Trad, founder of the Islamic Friendship Association, said the government of Prime Minister John Howard would have responded more swiftly if the crisis had been elsewhere.
“I’m sure they would have acted a lot quicker if it wasn’t Lebanon and people of Lebanese background,” Trad said. “You just have to look at the way they reacted to other crises - Bali and East Timor - they used all their resources to get people out quickly.”
There are believed to be 25,000 Australian citizens in Lebanon, almost all of Lebanese descent and many with dual nationality.
But while the US and European countries have managed to repatriate thousands of their citizens, Australia has so far brought home fewer than 200 of its nationals.
“This government is initiating racism here,” Trad told Australia’s AAP news agency. “There are signs of the federal government breeding racism.”
Trad said Australia was tardy in its response because it had sided with Israel in the conflict.
“Our government is caught up in the constant blind support of the Israeli government,” he said, singling out Foreign Minister Alexander Downer as a slave to Israel.
“Alexander Downer said he was refused his request to Israel for a ceasefire, but when it comes to Israel, it’s ‘yes, sir, whatever you want, sir’ from him,” Trad said.
The government’s repatriation plans were thrown into disarray when the Turkish ferry it thought it had chartered was contracted to another party.
“The ship that we originally though we had chartered, that we were gazumped on, actually hasn’t come to Beirut in the end,” Downer said. “Whether we chartered it or not, wouldn’t have made any difference.”
The government yesterday defended its evacuation efforts, amid complaints from trapped citizens and worried relatives of chaos and delays.
Hundreds of Australians were left stranded at the port in Beirut yesterday after a ferry scheduled to take them to Turkey was double booked.
The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said it was facing a logistical nightmare and was trying to find places on ships and boats chartered by other countries evacuating their citizens.
“We learnt overnight that the vessel was double booked and that the Australian charter was not on it,” said a DFAT spokesman.
“This has happened frequently over the last few days, not just to Australia but to a number of other governments.”
Prime Minister John Howard defended the rescue effort. “It is a chaotic situation and it is easy to criticise a limited number of foreign affairs personnel who are operating in very stressful circumstances.”
Around 200 Australians have already been bussed to Syria to escape bombing raids launched by Israel last week after the militant group Hezbollah kidnapped two of its soldiers.
Downer said the evacuation was logistically very difficult, because of limited embassy resources including cars, and damage to roads and bridges inflicted by Israeli bombs.
“People have got to understand that this is a war zone and it is extremely difficult to get people out of a country which is subject to military attack,” he said.
Shaoquett Moselmane, mayor of Rockdale district in Sydney, said the government had shown no urgency.
“It could only be described as shameful in the full meaning in the word,” said Moselmane whose southern suburbs have a large Lebanese community.
Others complained it was impossible to access the Internet to read government bulletins, and questioned why Australia was not broadcasting advice on Lebanese television as other countries were doing.
Rami Abdallah said his wife and daughter were trapped in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley east of Beirut and had heard nothing from the embassy.
He told reporters he would fly to Syria and travel to Lebanon overland to help them.
“They sound terrified,” he said. “I understand the risks. I want to see my wife and daughter. There is no cost to that.” – Agencies |
