Horrifying accounts from Baxter Detention Centre

The following notes (abridged) are from a recent visitor to Baxter, who 
details the security procedures and destructive, inhuman conditions within 
the centre. "The image it presents is more consistent with a high security 
facility designed for psychological torture than a temporary detention 
complex", writes Anne Simpson of the Bellingen Rural Australians for 
Refugees who forwarded the report to The Guardian.

* It is a maximum security prison;

It is divided into nine compounds, four of which are in use at the moment 
(One for Sabaen Mandaen people, one for families, two for single men).

All of the compounds are constructed in a circular fashion with a 
continuous facade. There are no outward looking windows. The centre of the 
compounds is a grassed area. Each of the compounds has at least two guards 
on duty, who log in all incoming phone calls, control the videos, hand out 
property.

* There are no views from the compounds, only the sky and the grass. 
Detainees would be completely unaware of any outside activities.

* There are many cameras in each compound. The only place to be out of 
camera range is to stay in your room, or in the toilet, so most detainees 
that we spoke to are now staying in their rooms.

* There is a gym for detainees, with a strictly controlled timetable. Women 
don't tend to use it as there are always men about and they don't have any 
privacy.

* All gates and doors are controlled centrally from a computer. Only one 
door may be opened in the centre at any one time. You can wait for 10-15 
minutes for a door to open, and if one has been left open, the whole centre 
ceases to operate until it is closed.

* Everything is difficult for the detainees. Those who smoke have to ask a 
guard to light their cigarettes, and wait while electronic doors are 
opened.

Those who wish to see their friends in other compounds have to fill in a 
request form, and once a week they are taken to another compound (they are 
not taken to their friends' compound, but a sterile area, where no-one else 
is), and their friend will be there, and they then have a couple of hours 
to interact, with the obligatory two guards helping the spontaneity.

* Detainees told us that it takes five days to receive medical attention, 
and that when you do you will be told to drink lots of water and given 
Panadol for every ailment.

One lady that I spoke to had headaches and blocked sinuses for the past 
year and a half, coupled with a cough, all probably from the dust of Curtin 
and Port Augusta. Why can't they just manage some Beconase or Sudafed?

One other man that we met had gone blind at Curtin, he had been on a hunger 
strike, and always worked in the sun. This man is now completely blind and 
needs a carer (another detainee is doing this), but still hasn't had a 
medical assessment. He had excellent vision when he arrived in Australia, 
and is still young.

* There is no education happening for the children. Port Augusta school has 
rejected them. Baxter was trumpeted as the family friendly detention 
centre, and families in other detention centres are being pressured to go 
there, being told it is better. Baxter is the worst place that I have ever 
been. It is much worse than Woomera. Detainees from Curtin who have gone to 
Woomera, say that Woomera is much better, those from Curtin who have gone 
to Baxter say that Curtin is better than Baxter.

* There is no library. We took lots of Persian and Arabic books, but 
nowhere nearly enough for the voracious need for intellectual stimulation 
in there.

The people we met and talked of included a pharmacist, goldsmiths, 
engineers, teacher, electricians, psychiatrist, many students, a person who 
had read all of Shakespeare's works in Farsi, and were familiar with most 
of the Western classical traditions in literature and music, boys from 
Afghanistan who want to go to school, to contribute to Australia; children 
who love maths, physics, and chemistry and can't wait to go to university.

Children who are immersed in the humanities, surrounded by guards with a 
culture of distrust and suspicion. Guards who are used to the prison 
system, not a seven-month-old baby who was born in detention, not an old 
blind man, not a 16-year-old in a wheel chair, not a 60-year-old 
grandmother who wants to hug them.

* When we arrived to visit, we came armed with lots of snacks and goodies 
we hoped to share with our friends. Pistachios, almonds, Turkish delight, 
fruit pastes.

We could not take any of these things in with us. These things are security 
threats.

I had to fight to take in photos of my paintings (they weren't included in 
the list of approved of things, which said only one or two family 
photographs, I argued that the list makers haven't even noticed that 
culture exists).

* Only four people to visit at one time; cello, but no cello case, recorder 
must be kept in the office; no diaries allowed in. Detainees could not 
bring their family photos to show to us, or even some chocolate to share.

When you first arrive, the gate is opened for you by someone who records 
your number plate and name and wants to know the purpose of your visit. 
Then you park your car and the cameras are trained on you. You then go to a 
steel gate, press a buzzer and someone answers like it is a telephone, and 
you state your business.

After an arbitrary period of time (up to 10 minutes) a green light will 
come on and you may open the door, which you must shut behind you. You are 
then in a metal cage about five metres long, with two cameras in it, with a 
steel door on either end and a roof overhead.

You walk the length of the cage and press the next buzzer and wait again 
(only three people are allowed to be "processed" at once in the office).

Processing may take three quarters of an hour or longer, so you wait in the 
cage to be let in. After you make it through the next door you are then in 
the reception area. You then fill out forms, show your ID, and hand all 
gifts into property. After the usual checks you are then moved to the 
visitor centre (visiting hours are 8am-11am and 1pm to 4pm).

You go through more doors and then sign in to the visitor centre, where you 
are given a wrist band, and an invisible stamp (I'm sure mine was Pooh 
bear, but the guard would not be drawn on this serious subject).

Then they go and get your friends, which may take half an hour or an hour 
more.

When your friends finally arrive, you sit at a table, underneath another 
camera, in front of the guards, who are sitting behind a sheet of glass 
about four metres from you, doing nothing. There is cordial in a cool drink 
dispenser, lemon and ant flavoured. There is a big coke and drink machine, 
only for the guards' use, as no-one else is allowed to have any money.

You try to find somewhere for a private, comfortable chat. You take your 
choice of cameras...

* We were told that there is "trouble" every night in the single men's 
compounds.

A female guard we met outside the centre on said that she had just been 
sacked because she would not hit detainees with a baton, but a lot of the 
guards are big men, they look like they could pack a good punch.

* To attempt to compensate for their lack of educational opportunities, ACM 
[Australasian Correctional Management, the private company running the 
centre] are taking the children for weekly outings (except when they can't 
think of anywhere to go which happened the week that we were there).

The first week the children went to Port Augusta where they saw signs 
saying "fuck off refugees" and "deport the boat people" and "go home 
refugee dogs". Three weeks later some of those signs are still up in Port 
Augusta.

* Entertainment opportunities are fairly limited. One television channel, 
but the picture is ghostly, two videos per week, controlled by the guards 
from the compound offices. They had a projector in and showed the detainees 
Cleopatra with Elizabeth Taylor, which should have been very informative 
for Middle Eastern folk.

* One woman I met knits a jumper, then unravels it and knits it again to 
keep herself occupied.

* This place seems to be designed for creating maximum psychological 
distress in the detainees and perhaps the guards, and I suspect this will 
lead to disastrous results. Having grown Middle Eastern men weeping in my 
arms was almost unbearable; knowing that they are still there sickens me 
utterly.

People my age looked 20 years older, haggard and saddened. Many wanted the 
option to go to a safe third country, straight from Australia, fearing to 
go back to their country of origin; some think that they are going to die 
in detention and worry about the fate of their children who are there with 
them.

Since returning, we have heard from a friend that he had just spent three 
days in isolation for his persistent asking to visit a friend. The guards 
said that they were taking him on his visit, and instead delivered him to 
the isolation gaol.

I keep waiting for good news....

(Name omitted)