Source: The Australian

TWO years ago the Indonesian office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees had fewer than 50 Rohingya asylum-seekers on its books. Today there are more than 800, and nearly all are trying to get to Australia.

“Some of my friends have gone to Australia already and after two or three years they get citizenship,” Feazel Ali tells The Australian. “Finally they can live in peace.”

Ali left Myanmar in 1994 and lived in Malaysia for 13 years before he, his wife and five children took a boat to Sumatra two months ago, hoping somehow to get a passage to Australia.

“Australians have pity for refugees, but actually anywhere that wants to accept us, I wouldn’t mind,” he says.

“I want to work. I want my children to have a high school education.”

Like many other asylum-seekers, he clings to the illusion that Australians would welcome his family, if only they knew his people’s plight. The reality is, as refugee officials say privately, no government wants the Rohingya, who are commonly described as among the most persecuted people in the world. Read more