Iranian refugee Mehdi Ali released from detention in Australia after nine years
Iranian asylum seeker Mehdi Ali, who was only 15 when he was first detained in Australia, is now set to be released and allowed to start a new life in the United States.
In a tweet, Ali announced on Thursday that he would be leaving Australia, saying: “Tonight I am free and leaving Australia to start my life in the United State of America.
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"But I won’t be happy until all my friends are released from detention. It's not freedom until we are all free. Thank you for all your support.”
Middle East Eye has approached Ali for comment.
Part of Iran's Ahwazi Arab minority, Ali was indefinitely detained by the Australian government for nine years and held at the Park Hotel in Melbourne, which houses 30 more asylum-seekers.
Before moving to the immigration hotel, Ali was sent to various detention centres, moving from Christmas Island to Nauru, where he was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder from the abuse and mistreatment he experienced and witnessed there.
The detention centres have been dubbed as “island prisons”.
Australia's draconian immigration processing policy and practices have been dubbed the "Pacific Solution", which sees asylum-seekers diverted and detained in Nauru and Manus Island in Papua New Guinea.
The policies have been consistently criticised by the United Nations, human rights groups, and refugees themselves.
Park Hotel's conditions have also been condemned and gained more public attention after Serbian tennis player Novak Djokovic was stripped of his visa and held there. His mother referred to it as “not human”.
“His accommodation is terrible. It's just some small immigration hotel, if it is a hotel at all; with bugs, it's all dirty, the food is terrible,” she said.
As attention turned to the inhumane conditions that refugees had been living in, Ali, alongside others living in the hotel, took the chance to protest and demand the release of all those dealing with the brutality of the Australian immigration system on social media.
Ali was released alongside Adnan Choopani, another asylum-seeker who announced on Twitter that he would be leaving the immigration hotel and moving to Chicago.
In September 2016, the United States agreed to consider resettling refugees from Australia’s processing centres, including those offshore.
Though President Donald Trump criticised the agreement when he came to power, the deal still stands and is honoured by the Biden administration.
According to the Kaldor Centre, 968 refugees from Nauru and Papua New Guinea have been resettled in the United States.
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