Australia reveals it has turned back 28 asylum seeker boats in past three years

The Australian government says it has turned back 28 boats to prevent asylum seekers from reaching Australia during three years in power, with the latest carrying 21 Vietnamese intercepted this month.

The conservative coalition government on Wednesday warned that the boats would start coming from Indonesian ports in greater numbers if the centre-left Labour Party wins a national election set for July 2.

Border Protection Minister Peter Dutton said the 21 Vietnamese, including four children, where returned to Vietnam after their refugee claims were assessed and rejected at sea. He declined to give details of the interception.

Opposition leader Bill Shorten says a Labour government would maintain the same tough policies that have prevented any asylum seekers from reaching Australia by boat for two years.

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Rhetoric around Canberra’s controversial immigration policy has ramped up ahead of polls, and Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has denounced a Labour opposition pledge to allow illegal migrants already in Australia to stay permanently.

The Vietnamese boat was discovered north of Australia this month, with the 21 men, women and children on board processed at sea and then flown home, Dutton said.

“They claimed that they were wanting protection. It was found that they were not owed protection and they were returned back to Vietnam,” he said.

A boat carrying illegal migrants at Australia’s Christmas Island in the Indian Ocean. Photo: AFP

Under Canberra’s tough measures, asylum seekers trying to reach Australia by boat are either sent back to where they departed or to remote Pacific island camps, where living conditions have been criticised.

While Labour backs the policy of turning back illegal boat arrivals, it has said it would permanently settle the bulk of the 30,000 boatpeople who came ashore under the previous Labour governments of Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd, most of which are still waiting to be processed.

“This will send an absolutely unequivocal signal to the people-smugglers that under a Labour government, anyone who manages to get to Australia on a boat will be able to stay here permanently,” Turnbull told reporters.

“The people-smugglers are starting to market again and we know... they are marketing that there will be, or could be, a change of government in Australia and the way the opportunities to smuggle people to Australia will be open again.”

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Since the start of its “Operation Sovereign Borders” in September 2013, the government has managed to halt the flood of boat arrivals, and drowning, that characterised previous Labour administrations.

Turnbull said since the conservatives came to power, 28 boats carrying 734 people have been turned back with no successful arrival in almost 700 days.

(AFP)