There appears to be mixed support for Australia to begin an international discussion about about changes to the United Nations Refugees Convention.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has indicated the government might push for the 60-year-old agreement to be changed to reflect current movements of displaced people.
Mr Rudd is expected to announce a new asylum seeker policy in coming days.
Amanda Cavill has the details.
While there's no suggestion that Australia under a Rudd government would walk away from the UN agreement, Mr Rudd has flagged he's looking at the Convention.
"On our policies we are looking at this right now globally in terms of the effectiveness of the Refugee Convention. We are looking at it regionally in terms of our co-operation with our regional states in South East Asia and the South West Pacific hence my visit to Indonesia. Thirdly we need to also act on the challenge that we face in the refugee determination processes for our country."
The Convention is the key international legal document in defining who is a refugee, and outlines their rights and the legal obligations of signatory countries.
It defines a refugee as a person who is outside their country who is unable or unwilling to return due to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion.
If the Convention were to be changed, it could make it easier for Australia to reject refugee applications for people it deems to have left their home countries for economic reasons.
Foreign Minister Bob Carr has already expressed concerns there are many so-called economic migrants, particularly from Iran, coming to Australia on boats provided by people smugglers in Indonesia.
Former Labor Foreign Minister Gareth Evans says an international conversation about how the Convention operates in a world which has in effect become a global village is both timely and practical.
"I can't believe that Australia would ever walk away from our obligations under the Convention. But at the same time I think we have to recognise that for decades actually there have been concerns about the applicability of the Convention to the circumstances of the 21st century as compared to the post World War II years when it was first created. There are fundamental definitional problems. And there's real problems for example in differences, even if you take a very strongly pro refugee position there are problems about differential treatment for those in the camps waiting patiently for there turn and those with the mobility to get to a signatory country."
Australia is one of 147 signatory countries to the Refugees Convention.
It was adopted in 1951 to protect Europeans fleeing from the Second World War and was updated in 1967 removing geographical restrictions on where refugees could come from.
Opposition leader Tony Abbott won't comment on speculation that a coalition government would pull Australia out of the Convention.
But he says he has strong reservations about the interpretation of the Convention and its impact on domestic policies.
"Look the difficulty with the Convention is the way it's been imported into Australian law. That's the difficulty. It's the things that we do here in Australia as Australians that matter and we should get cracking on doing what we need to in this country and on our borders to fix this problem not raise yet another red herring* which is Mr Rudd leading some kind of an international crusade to change an international rule."
But human rights advocates do not agree.
The Refugee Council of Australia says changing the Convention would place in even more peril those people seeking to flee from persecution.
It says changing the definition of a refugee would put in limbo millions of people already seeking asylum.
And human rights lawyer David Manne has told Sky News the Refugee Convention has not diminished in relevance since it was created in 1951.
"It's stood the test of time and tragically is as relevant today as it was when it was created in the ashes of the Second World War, after the horrors of the Second World War. And as we see day in-day out, with for example the tragedies unfolding in countries such as Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq on a daily basis and so many other countries around the world, the Refugee Convention remains as relevant as ever."
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