{"id":16499,"date":"2014-12-01T12:41:41","date_gmt":"2014-12-01T19:41:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/?p=16499"},"modified":"2022-12-01T07:02:33","modified_gmt":"2022-12-01T14:02:33","slug":"pregnant-women-refugees-maryam-and-tahere-refuse-australias-prisons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/?p=16499","title":{"rendered":"Pregnant women refugees Maryam and Tahere refuse Australia\u2019s prisons"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/www.refugeeaction.org.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/Nauru-plane2.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"450\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Maryam and Tahere, two <a href=\"http:\/\/www.dailymail.co.uk\/news\/article-2855497\/Pregnant-refugees-refuse-bus-stand-authorities-Darwin-detention-centre.html\">Iranian<\/a> women, each <a href=\"http:\/\/www.perthnow.com.au\/news\/pregnant-detainees-refuse-to-get-off-a-bus-at-wickham-point-say-they-were-tricked-into-coming-to-darwin\/story-fnk1w5xw-1227141016181?nk=0169f536dcd12de508a953782845dd1c\">heavily<\/a> into the eighth month of pregnancy, are spending a third night on a bus outside the Wickham Point Detention Centre, in the <a href=\"http:\/\/uk.reuters.com\/article\/2014\/12\/01\/uk-australia-asylum-women-idUKKCN0JF1DV20141201\">blistering heat<\/a> of Darwin, in the Northern Territory of Australia, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.greenleft.org.au\/node\/50383\">Australia\u2019s refugee detention capital<\/a>. They <a href=\"http:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2014-11-30\/pregnant-refugees-nauru-protest-on-bus-at-wickham-point-darwin\/5928984\">refuse to get off the bus<\/a> and subject themselves to the indignities of the Australian prison system. Their story is the latest chapter in <a href=\"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/?p=15868\">Australia\u2019s shameful trade in refugees and asylum seekers<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Maryam and Tahere are Iranians who, with their families, have spent the last fifteen months in detention on Nauru. The Australian government found them to be `credible\u2019 refugees, and so were \u201cresettled\u201d within Nauruan communities earlier this year. When their pregnancies turned out to be too complex for the hospital on Nauru, they were flown to Australia \u2026 where they were put on a bus headed for the detention center. Their families offered to pay for <a href=\"http:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2014-12-01\/pregnant-woman-spotted-outside-bus-amid-refugee-stand-off\/5929958\">a motel in the area<\/a>, and the authorities refused. Apparently, the women are more valuable as `guests of the State\u2019 than on their own. And so the women said, \u201cEnough. No more. No!\u201d They <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/australia-news\/2014\/dec\/01\/pregnant-refugees-refuse-to-get-off-bus-in-nt-immigration-protest\">refused to leave the bus<\/a> and enter, or better re-enter, confinement.<\/p>\n<p>No good news comes from inside the walls of Wickham Point. At the beginning of the year, it was the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.smh.com.au\/federal-politics\/political-news\/womens-sanitary-products-sent-to-scott-morrisons-office-in-protest-20140107-30erc.html\">focus of a campaign protesting the humiliating treatment of women asylum seekers and refugees<\/a>. The treatment of asylum seekers in Wickham Point is often called <a href=\"https:\/\/newmatilda.com\/2013\/08\/28\/youre-detention-isnt-hotel\">dehumanizing<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2011-09-05\/20110905wickham-point-detention-pics\/2870640\">inhumane<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.greenleft.org.au\/node\/54941\">shameful<\/a>, and each report highlights the particular indignities that women are forced to undergo. Suicides, such as that of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/australia-news\/2014\/nov\/03\/afghan-asylum-seeker-sought-suicide-advice-before-taking-life\">Haidar Ali Ikhtiyar<\/a> last year, and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2012-11-03\/reports-of-children-self-harming-in-detention\/4351080\">self harm<\/a>, such as that of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2014-08-27\/asylum-seeker-self-harm-incident-darwin-refugee-advocates-say\/5701064\">17-year-old woman asylum seeker who jumped<\/a> from a second story window three months ago, are regular features at Wickham.<\/p>\n<p>Maryam and Tahere may or may not know the details of what\u2019s been transpiring at Wickham Point, but they know. They know it\u2019s a bad place. They know they deserve better. And so they have said, \u201cEither take me to a hospital here or ship me back to Nauru. Better <a href=\"http:\/\/www.skynews.com.au\/news\/national\/2014\/12\/01\/pregnant-refugees-refuse-to-leave-nt-bus.html\">a hellhole<\/a> than this.\u201d They know. They know that the desperate one here is the State, desperate to incarcerate and cage by any and all means. And they say, loudly and clearly, No!<\/p>\n<p>No good news comes from inside the walls of Wickham Point Detention Centre, but perhaps something like good news will come from outside the walls, the news of women\u2019s refusal and of women\u2019s insistence on their dignity.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>(Photo Credit: Refugee Action Coalition)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Maryam and Tahere, two Iranian women, each heavily into the eighth month of pregnancy, are spending a third night on a bus outside the Wickham Point Detention Centre, in the blistering heat of Darwin, in the Northern Territory of Australia, Australia\u2019s refugee detention capital. They refuse to get off the bus and subject themselves to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[275,5153,114,5166,556,4474,5055,554,4475,4476,5085],"class_list":["post-16499","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","tag-asylum-seekers","tag-australia","tag-dan-moshenberg","tag-detention","tag-haunts","tag-maryam","tag-prison","tag-refugees","tag-tahere","tag-wickham-point-detention-centre","tag-women","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16499","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16499"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16499\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26675,"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16499\/revisions\/26675"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16499"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16499"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16499"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}