August 7, 2020

immigration law shifts the humanitarian burden to masters of ships — SOLAS and UNCLOS place flag state obligations on masters of ships to rescue vessels in distress but the Immigration Act also makes them financially responsible for these . we won’t see something like cap anamur happening here, singapore just makes it expensive and inconvenient for the masters to do so, and make it a matter of the shipowners’ conscience instead of the government’s. )

our navy/coast guard has always had a hardline record since the 70s of driving off vietnamese boat people.

or perhaps we think we don’t even really need to care. we have search and rescue obligations but the modern waves of illegal sea migration originate from bangladesh and myanmar: they set their course for thailand, indonesia and malaysia via the andaman sea and straits of malacca. i looked up our search and rescue region coverage: mostly off the east coast of peninsula malaysia and to the southeast of cambodia. no one is coming that way, then. who are we rescuing? only those who make it past the straits of malacca and going to australia?

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mihael now, i always mention first up in my profile that i used to be a grad student in the humanities before i went to law school. i do this because the