Izzy’s story:
Written in port augusta lock up
Justice is far from very here, other peoples tears in the word freedom written in blood on the wall of the divi van, the plastic cable ties around my hands tight as they take us from one prison camp to another. "Please don’t apologise for getting me in trouble " I told them for your trouble if far more trouble then mine will ever be, my trouble is that I can not do enough.
I am waiting alone in this cell, I remind my self that the next few days I will spend in here are just a fraction of these people continually face, I will be released any day now but for them they wait there fate suspended indefinitely.
I was taken from Woomera to port Augusta with 17 of the refugees who had apprehended here we parted company. There was nothing I could say to console them...I just said good bye.... as uncle kev says 'its bigger than us ' this was the last thing a detainee said to me....’its bigger then us...”
Yesterday I was in jail in Woomera with refugees who had been caught escaping the detention centre and the drivers of the vehicles that had helped then escape. We danced sang and cried together in the cell. One by one people’s numbers were called. A refugee is named by the registration of the boat he or she came on. To the authorities their names are just numbers. To us these numbers were people that were crying in our arms. We waited, waiting for the inevitable. The other protesters were released on bail with conditions not to return to Woomera except for me.
I spoke to people the night of the escape, begging me to find them a way out, saying they would prefer to be sent back to their countries at the risk of dieing than to wait in Woomera, in detention with an unknown destiny. I saw the scars all over their bodies from the razer wire, bruises from being beaten by private security and the scars from repeated suicide attempts.
The afternoon the fences had come down men and women, many covered in blood from the razer wire were crying trying to pass their children through the bars, at the desperate glimmer of freedom the outside support flashed before them, a split second in a life time. In this spontaneous moment gloves blankets and wire cutters were thrown through the fence. If only we had more to offer. We were pulling on the fence chanting and screaming when a phenomenon happened. With little police interference at first the fence was broken and refugees dived from a hole about two and a half metres high into the crowd, like stage diving at a rock concert. More and more escaping into our midst, the chant of freedom began to feel very real. The cops moved in to surround us, pushing us back from the fence line. An other hole was made further down, more refugees made a run for our camp.
I noticed my friend with a young Muslim girl in her arms, being surrounded by police. The child screamed and cried as police attempted to remove her from my friend’s arms. I went over to asist her, the little girl clung to her for dear life. By the time they had removed her we were both on our knees in tears. The crowd had retreated back towards camp. People hassled us to leave with the group but a few of us stayed and watched through the gaps in the police line as right police used intimidation techniques, banging their batons against their shields to herd the remaining refugees back into the compound. We will be back we promised them. And I meant it with all my heart.
Back at the camp the police had grabbed quite a few of the escapees, but still over thirty remained hidden. A few police moved in on one tent wear a woman was hiding near the centre of the camp. The tent was quickly surrounded by protesters; the police maintained a presence around the blockade but no effort to force entry into it. Perhaps this was because hey were out numbered or because the considered it the jurisdiction of the federal protective services. For hours people surrounded the tent singing songs, linked arms, forming a human blockade. In the centre she swapped clothes with some one from camp and joined the blockade herself so that when the blockade dispersed, all that the police found was one of us sitting in the middle of the tent.
Tensions were high, many a rummer of police raid, even gossip of bringing in the military was bring discussed at an outrageously long winded meeting which I attempted to avoid. At a moment's passing it seemed to being dictated by panicky individuals with megaphones, making often ignorant and incriminating announcements, leading to trivial political debate. Meanwhile the many people uncaptivated by the meeting, found food clothes, blankets and money for the escapees, also arranging television and radio interviews, also attempting every means possible to get them somewhere safe. As I spoke to shadowy faces in the darkness they pleaded with me not to go back, many prepared o take their chances walking off into the desert night. Police had surrounded the camp. There was a police roadblock within sight and big stadium spotlights had been set up at either end of the camp. It was tricky we were not prepared for this situation. We studied maps for back roads, looked at possible long cross-country walks, it was a hard long night, it was hard to know what to do. If I had a car or a bike, anything I could offer them I would. The police could raid at any moment, think fast these people’s freedom is depending on us. What would happen to them if they got caught? It was a thousand thoughts at once. I have never been more physically and emotionally exhausted. Wondering in the dark, trying to find cars to get them out, not knowing if it would work. I watched as one car after another made it through the first police roadblock. Crossing our fingers, just praying they’d make it.
The next day there was roumers that some people had been caught and the drivers arrested. The press was apparently saying that everybody had been apprehended, but it we also knew that it was impossible for them to do a head count inside the detention centre o determine how many were missing due to riots that had occurred during the night. So we all had hope that some made it, even if it was only one person it was better than nothing, though I got areal good feeling it was more than one.
La M’s story:
Last weekend about a thousand people went out to the Woomera detention centre, South Australia to protest against the incarceration of refugees at Woomera and other centres across Australia. Woomera is in a remote area, surrounded by desert and part of the Woomera prohibited area, a large zone that has seen British nucleor tests in the 50's and is still the location of military testing (currently Japanese missiles) and a disused American spy base. 80 kilometres down the road is Roxby Downs, a large uranium mine. Woomera is on Kokatha and Arabuna land, indigenous nations who suffered radiation related sickness and dispossessstion as a result of the nucleor test and still continue to suffer as a result of the mine and a threatened national nucleor dump. Rebecca Bear Wingfield, a representative of the Kokatha people who was at Woomera this weekend said that aboriginal people did not want the refugees to be imprisoned on their land. She also point out the connections: uranium mined at Roxby ends up as bombs and depleted uranium weapons used in wars which create more refugees.

The refugee issue has been a hot political topic here. John Howard used his merciless attitude to the Tampa boat people to boost his election popularity; Australia is the only developed nation to incarcerate asylum seekers in places like Woomera. Detainees have been using desperate measures to protest the conditions within this privately run jail; there have been hunger strikes and suicides. People have been sewing their lips together to express the violently imposed silence they are existing in. Amnesty international and the U.N. have criticised the centres. For many of us coming to Woomera was a kind of a pilgrimage, undertaken to let detainees know that although they are locked up in the desert out of touch with the outside world, they were not forgotten. The protest was about proving that as far as many ordinary Australians were concerned the detainees are welcome and to sent out a strong message to the world that they should be freed. Some people were talking about freeing them ourselves but that only seemed like a dream....

Thursday...
A camp gets set up out side the gates, maybe 200 people. The police try to evict the camp and attempt to make some arrests. People get de-arrested straight away and we manage to hold the camp. All around is flat desert scrub, broken only by the fences.
Friday...
We walked down to the perimeter fence and tried to wave flags and banners to the detainees. With binoculars we could just make out some people on the rooves of the porta cabins they are kept in. These were some of the people we had come to support. They seemed so out of reach.

Busloads of more protesters arrive from the cities and the camp expands. We are a very diverse mob of more than a thousand people. After much lengthy discission it is decided that we will march down to the centre and try and reach the refugees, we are bringing flowers and toys, despite what the press where later to allege about a premeditated and tooled up bust out operation the only boltcropers around were an 8 foot high symbolic set. Off we went and before we knew it we were all inside the perimeter fence, the south Australian police just watching it happen. Then we were at the razer wire and face to face with the detainees, only a few metres of steel railing and razer wire separating us. This was an incredibly emotional moment, people were crying, reaching through to touch hands; I will never forget those people’s faces. There were mainly young men across the fence from us but also some women and kids. One man pointed out his son to us " now he is five, he was two when we came here." Then quite suddenly some of the men managed to break some of the fencing, it seemed to actually be quite weak. One by one they clambered out, stage diving down onto the excited mob of protesters.
Still the police seemed to be paralysed; maybe they couldn't believe what was happening. The escapees melted quickly into the throng of people, swapping t- shirts and hats and running with us in big groups back to camp. Finally the police waded in to move people back from the fence and secure the prison once again.

Back at the camp every one was in a state of shock and excitement about what had just happened. A big full orange moon rose over the camp, a few police prowled around and hasty plans started to be made. A big knot of people clustered at the centre of camp around one escapee, preventing the police from taking her, after quite a long stand off, the protesters dispersed and the police's quarry seemed to disappear into thin air right in front of their noses. It was a strange night, everyone was wired, excitement giving way to tension as people started to realise what a serious situation we were all in and how difficult it was going to be to get the escapees out of camp and safely away. Arguments broke out about we should be doing. Some people said the detainees should be handed back, that life on the run outside the detention centre would be too hard and if they were caught the penalties would be too great. Fortunately most people were ready to listen to the escapees themselves and hear what they wanted to do. (We had interpreters and many of them spoke good English) Nearly all of them were adamant that they did not want to go back, they would take they're chances on the run.

Many strong and intense connections were made that night, huddled in tents and shadows, swapping clothes, shaving beards and watching out for undercover cops. We heard heart breaking stories of the detainees experiences at Woomera and of the terrifying circumstances which had lead them to seek asylum. One man that I met had fled Iran after the government had killed his father and grandfather and locked his mother up in prison for ten years. He had been detained in Australia for three years and now he had had enough. Many escapees told us of torture and brutality with in the centres in Australia.

What struck me about people like this man and others that we met that night was they're gentleness. All were extremely polite, only excepting gifts of money or tobacco after much persuasion. We might have seemed like a band of freaks to them, with our weird clothes and hair, but these cultural differences became irrelevant. We were friends, willing to take the risk of stepping outside the law to help our new friends in a desperate situation.

I was convinced that the police would raid the camp at some point but it never happened. We didn't get much sleep that night and by the next day most of the escapees had been spirit away by desert pixies or abducted by friendly aliens. The police had set up roadblocks though and it wasn't long before about 40 of the 50 escapees were caught.

Saturday

We started to hear news of people who the roadblocks had caught. The protesters involved were being charged with aiding and abetting escapees who carries a maximum of four years. The escapees were also facing prison and in some cases maybe deportation. For some of them deportation would amount to a death sentence, they would certainly be killed back in the situation they had fled from. Friends caught on the road trying to drive one guy out told me that as they were arrested he kept apologising to them for having got them in trouble.

Everyone marched back up to the prison with the intention of delivering toys and a banner that lots of people had signed. The march had a parade vibe with drums and costumes including escaping alien pussycat refugee from war torn planet (commander star-light!) being hunted by an evil alien bounty hunter (me!). Once again the perimeter fence gave way before us and we could have all continued around to greet the detainees once again face to face but most people hesitated, going into an impromptu and pointless meeting about it all mid march. (For me the lengthy dogmatic and unconstructive meetings were a low point of the whole action) A few of us continued into the outer part of the prison and got up to the compounds before the cops turned us back. Once again we could see and be seen by the people inside. There were a few people arrested at this point and one subversive nurse, dressed in a P.V.C. uniform and feather boa got ripped violently of the fence with out warning, lacerating her arms and belly.

Sunday

Our dust coated mob approach the compound one more time, attempting to walk right around the prison. Now the police are out in force with motor cross body armour and horses. We find ourselves once again face to face with refugees, there are many more women and small children this time. One old lady is blowing us kisses, one man speaks to us at length, of their desperation of the their desire to be free. Riot cops stand between us this time, raising their batons at the incarcerated asylum seekers. A women can be heard screaming and screaming, the kind of sound which chills you to the bone. Behind us two whirl winds come, one cuts right through the police line and freaks their horses.try aresting that! Whirly whirlies, great towers of dust and air, ancient wind spirits from the desert bringing in freedom...

Monday
We go to Baxter, a soon to be openned detention centre near Port Augusta, south of Woomera. The mayoress of port Augusta said on the radio that we protesters should all be locked up with the "illegal" and see how we got on then. This actually did happen with escapees and the people who had tried to help them being held together at Woomera nick. My friends who were in there said they were all swapping songs and rhymes, laughing and crying together.

Many of us have been part of protests against violence, war, globalised injustice, bad things that happen in far away places, but this was different. This time we were face to face with the people we wanted to help. This time we had to be concerned with how to keep escapees hidden and safe, how to get them away and where to take them and how to help them built lives of their choosing. Even for those of us who will not be directly involved in any of this the events at Woomera last weekend make us aware of how endless the tasks we are trying to attempt are. Were does it stop with these people from Iran, Iraq or Afghanistan who we had just met who were asking our help? Listening to them? A bit of cash? A warm jacket? A risky lift to the city? Sharing your home with them for a while? Activism isn't just about going to an action or a march, it is an ever expanding spiral, it's a relationship to the people who's rights and freedoms we try to defend, to each other and to ourselves as we try to break from of oppression and to the land we love and try to defend, heal and be healed by.