Five- year-old Lankan refugee separated from his father in Australia...

A five-year-old Sri Lankan boy has been separated from his father indefinitely because of a negative security assessment from the Australian intelligence agency, ASIO. In February last year, Sharthi, and his parents, were granted refugee status by Australia, Australia newspaper reports.

The boy and his mother were released from a detention centre but his father remains locked up with no right of appeal. The father, who does not want to be named because he fears relatives in Sri Lanka might be targeted, cannot even find out the reason why ASIO gave him a negative assessment. Sharthi and his father have now been separated for 14 months and supporters are concerned about the impact the prolonged separation is having on the five-year-old boy. Refugee advocate Alison Sloan, who drives Sharthi to the detention centre once a week to visit his father, says he is very stressed and overwhelmed. “He has nightmares. He calls out for his father. He doesn’t like to be alone and he doesn’t like his mother or anyone else in his circle to be out of his sight for too long,” she said. When Sharthi was released from detention, his mother told him his father had to stay to work at Villawood, but that was an excuse that did not last for long. “It’s been 14 months now. He knows his father is not allowed to leave Villawood,” Ms Sloan said. “He knows he can’t come home, but he really has no idea why. He doesn’t understand.” Sharthi’s father is one of 46 refugees locked up who have failed ASIO security assessments. Because they have been granted refugee status, they cannot be returned to their country of origin, but the Australian Government will not release them because of the negative ASIO assessments. But none of this makes sense to Sharthi. Ms Sloan says it is heartbreaking to watch Sharthi say goodbye to his father at the end of each visit. “I want to grab them both and run out of there with them. It’s so unfair to do that to a child.” The majority of the detained refugees are Tamils, an ethnic group who live predominantly in northern and eastern Sri Lanka. http://www.winjaffna.com/