Australians may use force to end standoff

The Australian government today said it may use force to end a tense standoff with about 300 armed asylum seekers who rioted and torched a building at a remote detention camp over the weekend.

The siege at the Curtin detention centre in the northwest of Western Australia state began on Friday night when 28 guards were injured and thousands of pounds worth of property destroyed in a riot.

Acting immigration minister Chris Ellison claimed the protest was being organised by a hard core of refugees who faced deportation after their asylum applications were rejected.

Authorities said the rioters had armed themselves with knives and meat cleavers stolen from a kitchen and makeshift weapons including sharpened broom handles.

‘‘We want to resolve this peacefully, but if the detainees ... don’t, then we’ll have to consider action,’’ Mr Ellison said.

In a bid to isolate the ringleaders, women and children have been invited to leave the group and negotiators have been flown in to the camp which holds about 340 detainees mostly from the Middle East and central Asia.

The Curtin camp is in one of Australia’s most remote places 2,020 miles north west of Sydney and 1,120 miles north of the state capital, Perth.

It is one of five camps on the Australian mainland where asylum seekers are held while their applications for refugee status are processed.

Over the past two years the camps have been hit by riots, arson, and break-outs and some detainees have turned to self-mutilation.

Some refugees - including women and children - whose asylum applications have been rejected have been held for more than three years because Australia does not have diplomatic links with their home countries and they cannot be returned.

Penny Birch, a spokeswoman for the Refugee Action Coalition, said today witnesses had claimed camp guards sparked the riot by beating refugees.

She said riots were to be expected in the camps because indefinite detention was psychologically traumatising for detainees.