A friend from Melbourne, who has been the victim of ‘anti-wog’ racism since migrating to Australia as a child with his family, often quips that, “Sometimes you have a lucky day and you don’t realise it at the time.” Yesterday may be just one of those days for me!
My day started with this e-mail from a regular BlakandBlack reader, which I have copied in full, below. While I don’t intend to comment on an on-going trial, it is worth noting the similarities in content between this e-mail and information that was recently passed onto me by a reader of my blog who hails from Afghanistan. While the geography may have shifted, the issues remain the same.
Good Morning,
Standen’s trial starts this morning,
Former AFP agent and wife of Mark Standen’s co-accused Bill Jalalaty; Dianne Jalalaty rang me and asked if i could walk her in the court house from town hall station, as she is “afraid for her life”, she has given evidence against both the NSWCC and the AFP for corruption involving drugs, and now she is listed to give evidence on behalf of the AFP against the NSWCC, what an incestuous joke. how can the AFP use her to give evidence on their behalf when less than 3 months ago she was naming senior AFP officers corrupt involvement with a Colombian drug syndicate…who are also involved in the case against Standen and her husband .. (I have been given this information should anything happen to her) now she is asking that i protect her as she feels as though those AFP agents she named or those loyal or exposed to Standen will come after her, you wouldn’t read about it , (in fact you will lol)
Today we have CDPP; Tim Game is prosecuting the very man who gave him his start in the NSWCC Mark Standen; Game the same man who is strongly rumoured to be evidenced in wrongdoing for his involvement in some of Standen’s suspect cases should a royal commission be approved (post Standen conviction)
Today they are picking a jury, i cant help remember Standen and the NSWCC method of, if they lost a case bringing the jury members into their offices and grilling them on why they didn’t give a guilty verdict then Quote: ruining their lives; How can anyone have confidence in a NSW court of law…
You have Standen known to boast he has NSW judges and prosecutors compromised, who is being prosecuted by his long time friend on evidence supplied by Dutch authorities who have lost confidence in the AFP; and the AFP who are looking to have Standen found guilty of a crime they themselves are recorded being part of…..
My day concluded with a phone call from a former colleague and senior ACT Department of Treasury employee who informed me that:
“…neither Stanhope [the Chief Minister of the ACT] nor the AFP will address the issue of the assault which I keep blogging about… [and that]…I’m wasting my time in trying to draw people’s attention to it because nobody cares… and that he has complete faith in the AFP and doesn’t accept a word of what I say about them on BlakandBlack.”
After informing my former colleague that, “almost without exception, everything I have said about the AFP was already in the public domain and well documented by the mainstream media”, the conversation quickly terminated.
What links these two issues is a small article which appeared in today’s edition of The Daily Telegraph under the banner: Australians like Ku Klux Klan, says former Klan leader. Below is the full text of that article:
A FORMER Ku Klux Klan leader says racism in parts of Australia is reaching a similar intensity to what he saw growing up in the United States’ Deep South.
Johnny Lee Clary, a former KKK Imperial Dragon who left the organisation after 14 years, found God and became a church minister, said yesterday that prejudice and hatred Down Under ran deeper than most people cared to admit.
“I’ve been coming to Australia for 12 years and I see just as much racism here as I have in America. A lot of people in Australia like to pretend that it doesn’t exist but it does,” he said.
Mr Clary is in Port Stephens to speak to school children about his life and how he came to realise that racism and prejudice are wrong.
Those of us who are ‘of colour’ will know all too well the truth of Johnny Lee Clary’s statement. Not only are Australians racist, we as a nation are blind to our faults. If people take the time to sit back and reflect on the issues I have raised regarding the Australian Federal Police, they will note that each issue involves corruption or alleged corruption that has resulted in a denial of justice. More to the point, excluding the Standen issues, each involves a person who is either of non-European extraction or is married to a person of non-European extraction.
Dr Muhamed Haneef is an Indian doctor who was wrongly accused of aiding terrorists. He was arrested on 2 July 2007 at Brisbane Airport, on suspicion of terror-related activities. He is the second cousin once removed of Kafeel Ahmed and Sabeel Ahmed, the operatives in the 2007 Glasgow International Airport attack. Haneef’s ensuing detention became the longest without charge in recent Australian history.
Haneef was released when the Director of Public Prosecutions withdrew its charge on 27 July 2007. In December 2010, Haneef returned to Australia to seek damages for loss of income, interruption of his professional work, and emotional distress. He was awarded $1,800,000 in compensation from the Australian government.
Mr. Fred Martens who was married to a PNG national is suing the Australian Government and the Australian Federal Police for $45,000,000 claiming that:
OFFICERS from the Australian Federal Police allegedly stole and concealed documents that could have helped a former pilot and businessman fight allegations he had raped a 14-year-old girl in PNG.
As a result of AFP incompetence or corruption, Mr. Martens spent nearly 3 years in jail for a crime he did not commit.
Former Guantanamo Bay detainee Mamdouh Habib (an Australian citizen of non-European extraction) received an undisclosed payout from the Australian government, apparently triggered by untested witness statements implicating Australian officials in his detention and brutal maltreatment in a Cairo military prison, in return for dropping his law suit. The law suit accused the Commonwealth of complicity in his 2001 CIA rendition to Egypt, where he was detained and tortured for seven months before being transferred to Guantanamo Bay. Habib was later released without charge.
Then there is the long running saga of child sex charges against former Solomon Islands Attorney-General Julian Moti QC (an Australian citizen of Indian extraction), who was arrested at Brisbane International Airport in December 2007 and charged with seven counts of engaging in sexual intercourse with a person under the age of 16. The charges relate to the alleged rape of a 13-year-old girl in Vanuatu in 1997.
Mr Moti QC continues to protest his innocence and to draw attention to the coincidence between his public stance against RAMSI while Attorney-General of the Solomon Islands and the opportunistic actions of the Australian Government and the Australian Federal Police in charging him, even though the original charges against him had been thrown out of court by Vanuatu magistrate Bruce Kalotiti, and considerable legal costs were ordered to be paid as the magistrate ruled that he had no case to answer.
There are a number of uncomfortable parallels between what is currently happening to Mr Moti QC and what has happened to Mr Martens.
While many keep telling me that Australians are reticent to take a stance on the racism issue, because they don’t want to jeopardise their comfortable middle-class existence, the very fact that this undercurrent of racism is allowed to flourish unchecked in Australia is a sure way to create an environment of resent and hatred, which in turn could create the very scenario that the middle class wants to avoid.
I for one am sick and tired of being denied justice, because I had the temerity to complain about being racially attacked and bullied by a wannabe Klansmen. I suspect that I am not alone in harbouring this resentment.
I would like to share my experience in Australia. I have been in Australia for more than two years. I migrated from South East Asia.
I experience several times being discriminated. It is quite interesting, I got some experience from various races. So I have experienced being harrased, bullied, assaulted, etc (due to race and guess what religion also), by white, brown, mideasterners, aboriginals, etc.
My friend used to work in govt dept in Australia, however some guys from mideastern, once they knew about it, they insulted her as a bitch or dog, or else. While the white, when I tried to report for some matters, they harrased me very rude. While the brown skins, they put one of my friends under difficulties from the consulate of country of origin (some of the staffs there…), due to he has fairer skin than them. The aboriginals, or samoans, also discriminated in some occasions. So from each race, there are a few of them, harras/ assault/ bully/ torture others based on race/ religion. While my aussie friend (a white irish guy), said to me with the analogy like this –> First there was a group of British fishermen, they did their job, and no any competitors. After that, a group of Irish fishermen, and they made enemies. Then a group of Italian fishermen, came, then the British and the Irish made friends, and they were against the Italian. Then Greek fishermen came, the others united and they were against the Greek. Then a group of Vietnam fishermen, came, they were treated as the enemy by the others, that joined together. Aka might be, the discrimination is only the minor problem. However the matters that raise those “discrimination”, is competition, from different races in Australia. Since the white policy, up to now, the flow of immigration keeps coming to Australia. Me and my friends, experienced and saw that some people are more related with their own groups, instead of the a whole people in the country. The groups might be based on races, or religions. So if you are from the Japan group, some others from different group, might bully you or harras you. It is like a bullying activities, for ‘a disapproved orientation program’ as the ‘torturing opening ceremony’ for the newcomers. Some persons experience those things, and some other don’t experience it. It depends from what makes the bullyers irritated (anything can be their reasons, even some times, it is only their reason aka non sense). The more surprising thing in this case, is one of my friends, even still experience many problems in Australia after he/ she migrated to Australia, due to the consulate from the country of origin. They put and ban him/ her, from employment matters, education matters, social life (mating), etc. The consulate officers even hack, tapp, slander, and track him/ her everywhere, etc.
Aboriginals get angry because imigrants dont acknowlge the real owners of this country and inturn become the white oppressors and benefit of the proceeds of crime aswell, silence is just as guilty. Imigrants come here and suck up to the white anglo majority and ignorance in not an excuse, those who claim aboriginals have given them a hard time I must ask you this, What have you done for the owners of the land that is giving you a chance, this is our country and no one acknowlges it, most are the same as the anglo majority and promote intolerance. IGNORANCE IS NOT AN EXCUSE.