The Albanese government will strike a new funding deal with Papua New Guinea (PNG) to support asylum seekers after the country threatened to send them back to Australia unless a fresh agreement was signed.
The Greens’ immigration spokesperson, David Shoebridge, said the secrecy behind the deal was “staggering”, with Labor “providing an undisclosed amount of public funds to PNG to hold refugees that sought asylum here over a decade ago”.
“Let’s make this very clear, the only reason the government provided this funding is because PNG rightfully sees this whole arrangement as condescending and unfair … and refugees are in a life-or-death situation,” he told Guardian Australia.
“The obvious response is to bring those refugees here and give them the care they need.”