SIEV-X second anniversary report: "I [Margo Kingston] went to a conference last night where Julian Burnside spoke, probably the leading pro bono barrister trying to obtain justice for the boat people. He said he was arguing in Court for Iranian reffos who had been found not to be genuine asylum-seekers. He was trying to stop them being sent back to Iran because they were certain to be tortured. He actually had a video that he spoke about in flat terms - which did not make it any easier to hear - a video of a man lying on a table with his family beside him and a group of officials reading in a bureaucratic manner a long document, in the process of which the man on the table's eyes were taken out and they were put on a towel.

"He said that the government's response in the Court was: 'Let's assume that it's true that the Iranian people we will send back to Iran will be tortured in this way, under the Migration Act we still have the right to do it - and we will do it'"

SIEV-X second anniversary report: "I [Margo Kingston] went to a conference last night where Julian Burnside spoke, probably the leading pro bono barrister trying to obtain justice for the boat people. He said he was arguing in Court for Iranian reffos who had been found not to be genuine asylum-seekers. He was trying to stop them being sent back to Iran because they were certain to be tortured. He actually had a video that he spoke about in flat terms - which did not make it any easier to hear - a video of a man lying on a table with his family beside him and a group of officials reading in a bureaucratic manner a long document, in the process of which the man on the table's eyes were taken out and they were put on a towel.

"He said that the government's response in the Court was: 'Let's assume that it's true that the Iranian people we will send back to Iran will be tortured in this way, under the Migration Act we still have the right to do it - and we will do it'"