Gillard On Ali Jasmin: Wooden, Stubborn, Stupid And Dumb

Project SafeCom Inc.
Web: http://www.safecom.org.au/

Gillard On Ali Jasmin: Wooden, Stubborn, Stupid And Dumb

Media Release
Thursday April 19, 2012 7:00am WST

"Prime Minister Julia Gillard's response to the astounding revelations on television last Monday in Hamish McDonald's report by Channel Ten's The Project cannot be interpreted as anything but roundly stupid, insensitive, laughable and inappropriate," WA Human Rights group Project SafeCom said this morning.

"Ms Gillard stubbornly maintained against overwhelming testimony and documentation shown on television that the young man jailed in WA for people smuggling was "an adult" who could "appeal his sentence". In contrast to the Prime Minister, Member for O'Connor Tony Crook MP responded appropriately, demanding an Inquiry into the case of Ali Jasmin."

"Hamish McDonald's television report showed no less than four identity documents claiming that Ali Jasmin, an Indonesian asylum boat crew member was prosecuted and convicted of people smuggling in a Perth court when he was just FIFTEEN years old," spokesman Jack H Smit said.

The Report has now also been posted on YouTube - at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43_5sq_saQY

The Global Mail carries McDonald's written report of the same story at
http://www.theglobalmail.org/feature/an-age-of-uncertainty/190/

"Hamish McDonald travelled to Indonesia to meet Ali Jasmin's family, and his mother and sister both appear on camera. McDonald returned to Australia with several corroborating documents showing Ali Jasmin's date of birth. One of the documents was faxed to the Perth Indonesian Consulate during tbe trial but never submitted to the court in a flagrant bureaucratic bungle where his defence lawyer in the TV report appears incapable of rising above this procedural bungle," Mr Smit said.

"We need to immediately hear from Attorney-General Nicola Roxon, Ali Jasmin needs to be released from prison immediately and returned to his family, while the government ought to offer a generous financial compensation package to the family."

ENDS

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