Stepping away from interest rates for a moment: Amnesty International has branded the latest move to send stateless former immigration detainees to Nauru as a cruel “backdoor deportation scheme”.

On Sunday, Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke announced he’d struck a deal with the Nauruan government to take members of the cohort released after the NZYQ High Court ruling – which found indefinite detention to be unlawful.

Mr Burke revealed three of the former detainees – some with much-publicised criminal records – have already been granted visas to live freely in Nauru. 

Amnesty International today described the deal as a “blatant attack on the human rights of people seeking protection”.

“After everything these individuals have endured—the trauma, the health struggles, the fear of persecution—the absolute last thing they should face is deportation,” said Amnesty International’s Australian Refugee Rights Campaigner Zaki Haidari.

“The Labor government must put an immediate stop to these deportations. Australia must uphold its international obligations, ensure humane resettlement pathways, and guarantee that no refugee or asylum seeker is placed at further risk of harm.”