Australia resolute defying pressure

Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd yesterday said he made "absolutely no apology" for his hardline new policy of sending asylum-seekers to Papua New Guinea as hundreds protested in Sydney.
Under the directive, those who pay people-smugglers to arrive on unauthorised boats will be sent to the poor Pacific nation for processing and resettled there -- even if judged to be genuine refugees.
Rudd, who was last month reinstalled as prime minister, moved quickly to announce a radically reshaped immigration plan under which boatpeople could be resettled in PNG, sent home or to a third country -- but not to Australia.
The plan has worried the United Nations refugee agency, which said Friday that conditions at Papua New Guinea's Manus Island facility currently failed adequately to protect refugees.
"UNHCR is troubled by the current absence of adequate protection standards and safeguards for asylum-seekers and refugees in Papua New Guinea," it said in its first assessment of the policy.
Asylum-seekers are a sensitive issue in Australia, and one set to feature prominently in the election due this year.