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I notice that the immigration politics surrounding Sri Lankan Tamils is still quite strong in Australia whereas it dies mostly by the middle of the 2000s everywhere else, most notably I think that Sri Lankan Tamils in Australia tend to be unusually supportive of immigration too.
The Civil War in Sri Lanka had ended by the late 2000s and most refugees had stopped leaving the island by the mid 2000s, in general, any refugees arriving in the 2010s are unlikely to be in a situation worse than that found throughout the third world including China.
The problem of economic immigrants classing themselves as asylum seekers is quite common throughout the developed world and affects not only Sri Lankan Tamils but many South-East Asians and Middle Easterners too.
I would categorize most of these asylum seekers from Sri Lanka as economic immigrants. I would suggest that they should use the correct channels to apply for economic immigrant status in Australia rather than enter through asylum seeking channels.
Furthermore, any issues that a currently problematic in Sri Lanka, remembering that the tensions between Tamils and Sinhalese is mostly non-existent nowadays, should be solved through foriegn policy channels rather than immigration channels.
(Obviously, I might be wrong about most Australia Sri Lankan Tamils being supportive of immigration but I think I'm right).
Few if any Sri Lankan Tamils have been accepted as refugees to Australia ,from my knowledge, in recent years. A number of boats intercepted on the high seas heading to Australia or actually making land in Cocos Islands or in one case Geraldton WA , have been returned with the minimum of fuss.
The Australian Sri Lankan community may well support such asylum seekers, some may even have relatives seeking entry in such a manner. (although probably not officially supporting) but hardly surprising if elements within the community did so.
Saying that a lot suffered over the war period and to what extent the repair of the fallout from those times, has been implemented would be an indicator as to reasons people continue to seek better lives abroad.
Probably few countries concern themselves with the domestic politics of Sri Lanka to any extent to have the ability to influence.
The Tamil community of Australia, as in other countries, is made of ethnic Tamils from a range of countries, of course. Not just Sri Lanka. Malaysia and Singapore while not forgetting India obviously, all of whom may well have differing views with regards to Sri Lankan Tamil entrants as refugees.
Most of the selected legal asylum seekers being accepted now are from Africa. There is a deliberate policy of secrecy surrounding the management of asylum seekers trying to enter illegally by boat. As said above boats are turned around, people are settled offshore for assessment and not allowed to ever settle here. People overstaying their legal visas, a good number of whom are American and British, are kept in immigration detention centres before deportation.
So there should not be much pull for Sri Lankan Tamils to try to get refugee status. I have not heard anything about it in the media for a long time.
Agree in part with above poster apart from claiming most' legal' intake of refugees (although not illegal to claim or seek asylum of course) Perhaps official intake a better term?
I digress, the source of intake over recent years has been Middle East, namely Syria and Iraq. I think you will find African sourced numbers rather low.
Perhaps the term should be people accepted for the refugee resettlement programme, or something like that.
You are correct in that it seems that Syrian and Iraq refugees have outnumbered African. I cannot find figures for last year though.
latest figures released have been for the 16 - 17 financial year. This latest just concluded year will not have figures until towards the end of this year, if not later.
African intake has been low since around 07 when Sudanese intake was slashed due to political/community reasons. Small yearly intakes of a few hundred from Congo, Ethiopia and Eritrea are more the dominant countries of recent years, although as mentioned at rather low numbers.
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