On Monday 6 April, 63 asylum seekers were taken to the detention centre on Christmas Island after being found on a boat near Ashmore Island. This is the fourth boat to reach Australian waters this year, bringing the total number of asylum seekers arriving by sea up to 187, already more then the 179 who arrived in 2008.

The opposition Spokeswoman for Immigration, Dr Sharman Stone, has suggested that this increase in boat arrivals can be attributed to the Labor government’s revised immigration policy. Dr Stone stated that “Australia is fast becoming a target destination for people smugglers” and “Quite clearly the message received by the people smugglers is that this is a lucrative market with strong chances of success.”

Amnesty International rejects the idea that the Rudd government’s attempts to make immigration policy in Australia more humane, such as the end of Temporary Protection Visas and the Pacific Island Policy, have been responsible for any increase in asylum seekers arriving by sea.

Instead, Amnesty International believes that rising numbers of asylum seekers can clearly be attributed to a wider global trend. The UNHCR’s recent report, Asylum Seeker Levels and Trends in Industrialized Countries, shows that there has been a 12% increase world wide in asylum applications over the past year.

In 2008, 29 of the 51 asylum countries included in the report registered an increase in asylum requests. Italy (+122%), Norway (+121%), the Netherlands (+89%), Turkey (+70%), Switzerland (+53%), Canada (+30%) and several others, received the brunt of the increase but Australia, with an increase of 19%, was not one of the most affected countries.

It is often argued that Australia’s small population size means that we are harder hit by increases in asylum seekers. However, the UNHCR report also analyses levels of asylum applications on both a per capita and GDP basis, but Australia still does not make it into the top 10 affected countries.

These increases are not limited to industrialised nations. In Thailand the number of asylum-seekers has increased in the last few years, due mainly to the recent turmoil in Burma.

In Yemen, increasing refugee numbers is becoming a significant burden, largely due to Yemen’s open policy for Somali refugees despite the country’s limited resources. By the end of 2007, African refugees (mainly Somalis) made up nearly 4% of Yemen’s population.

This world wide increase in asylum applications has resulted from the deteriorating security situations in countries such as Afghanistan (+85%), Zimbabwe (+82%), Somalia (+77%), Nigeria (+71%), and Eritrea (+34%). For Australia the conflict in Sri Lanka is also significant.

Climate change and limited resources are further “push” factors forcing people to seek asylum. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Antonio Guterres, says that "climate change is today one of the main drivers of forced displacement, both directly through impact on environment - not allowing people to live any more in the areas where they were traditionally living - and as a trigger of extreme poverty and conflict."

Australia is relatively sheltered from the effects of these security, environment and economic crises due to its geographical advantages and that is why we haven’t experienced the same huge increases in asylum seekers that have occurred in Europe. However, in today’s integrated world Australia cannot remain completely immune to international events and the rise in the number of asylum seekers arriving by both sea and air is an inevitable consequence of this.

Amnesty International rejects any attempt to analyse increases in asylum applications in Australia that does not take into consideration the global environment. An increase in asylum applications both in Australia and globally, shows that this issue is wholly an international phenomenon and cannot be attributed to the Australian government’s policy changes.

It is likely that the number of people forced to seek asylum will continue to rise over the coming years and Amnesty International believes that Australia, as a signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention, has an obligation to respond to this ongoing global crisis.