Comparative Approaches to Security and Maritime Border Control

• Author: Dale Stephens
• Position: Commander, Royal Australian Navy
• Pages: 19-30

II

Comparative Approaches to Security and

Maritime Border Control

Dale Stephens'

Remarkablyperhaps, the question of maritime border protection attracted an

unprecedented level of political debate during the course of the Australian

federal election of November 2001, ultimately becoming asignificant issue in de-

ciding the outcome of that contest. Indeed, the election became, in essence, arefer-

endum on the Federal Government's revised policy concerning strict maritime

border protection measures designed to prevent the influx of illegal migrants arriv-

ing by sea into Australia. This issue was principally ignited by the Australian Gov-

ernment's stance in denying the admission into Australia of 433 illegal migrants

rescued by the Norwegian container ship MV Tampa]in August of that year and

the subsequent passage by the Australian Parliament, on September 26, 2001, of

omnibus border protection legislation that provided for arobust legal regime.2

This new legislative scheme infused the Australian Defence Force (ADF) with sig-

nificantly greater authority to intercept and remove suspected illegal entry vessels

from Australia's maritime zones. There is no doubt that the reverberations of the

attacks of September 11, 2001 (hereinafter referred to as 9/11), which were in-

tensely felt within Australia at the time, also heavily influenced approaches to the

*Commander, Royal Australian Navy. The views expressed in this article are those of the author

alone and do not necessarily represent the views of the Australian Government, the Australian

Defence Force, or the Royal Australian Navy.