Refugee journalist awarded

PAPUA NEW GUINEA – A Kurdish Iranian journalist detained on Papua New Guinea’s Manus island by Australia has received a social justice award from a Sydney symposium.

Behrouz Boochani was recognised for reporting from detention at the Diaspora Symposium, which was staged at the Parliament of New South Wales.

The judge said Boochani was chosen despite criteria requiring the award to be given to Australian citizens.

She said Boochani was a citizen of the world, who’s reports from detention with a small mobile phone and restricted internet access remind us of the possibilities for resistance.

Boochani said he hoped the award will encourage notable Australians to criticise their country’s system of offshore detention.

“Academic people, writer people, artist people,” he said. “Those people that can make change and put pressure on the government.

“Why they are silent? I know some of them are trying, but I think the pressure is not enough.”

Boochani said he hoped the award gives him enough credit to continue to fight with the system.

- RNZI