The key witness in the Reza Barati murder trial has renewed calls to be transferred to a different compound saying he is being stalked by guards and fears he will be killed at the Manus Island detention centre.

Benham Satah’s repeated requests to be moved to a safer compound in the centre have been rejected, but now, a public petition to bring him to Australia has attracted more than 15,000 signatures.

Calls to PNG Immigration about Satah’s case have not been returned. Guardian Australia has submitted questions to detention centre manager Broadspectrum. The Australian Department of Immigration and Border Protection has declined to comment.

Satah, a Kurdish Iranian asylum seeker who has been held in the Manus Island detention centre for more than two years, told Guardian Australia he was most fearful at night: “Every single moment I think that someone might kill me.”



In October he was taken to court against his will, where he initially refused to testify, citing threats he would be killed. Taken a second time, and after being promised by Justice Nicholas Kirriwom and Manus Island detention centre operators he would be offered additional protection, Satah gave evidence against two local men accused of killing Reza Barati.

Barati, an Iranian asylum seeker, was beaten to death during a night of violence on 17 February 2014. He was hit with a nail-studded piece of wood and had a large rock dropped on his head.

More than 60 asylum seekers were injured in three days of rioting in the centre, including one man who was shot in the buttocks, one who lost an eye and one who had his throat slit.

Satah saw Barati die and provided a statement to police – matched by his evidence in court – saying he had seen more than a dozen people, including PNG nationals and expatriate guards, attack Barati as he lay prone at the top of a staircase.

Since being forced to testify publicly in court, Satah says he has been targeted by guards, and fears he will be killed for giving evidence in the trial of his friend’s alleged killers.

He says he suffers from “excruciating” chest pain, and his left arm and leg have been weakened, so he has trouble walking. He says doctors have told him it is caused by stress.



“I can never leave my room, it is not safe,” Sateh said. “I only go out for meals and to bathroom. At night time I can go to the mess because there is a [security] camera there.”

After being returned from court, Satah was returned to the SAA compound within the Manus Island detention centre, used for housing people suffering mental health issues, and where he was quarantined from local guards.



But after two weeks, Satah says, eight local guards came into the compound, “including one man who was involved in killing Reza Barati”.

“It was not an accident, they came to intimidate me, to show they can get to me wherever I am.”

Satah has since been moved to Foxtrot compound, but formal requests to be returned to Mike compound, where Satah says he feels safest, were rejected in December.

“After careful consideration and extensive discussion ... your request to move compounds has been denied,” his first rejection read, without further explanation.

He says guards sit at the back of his accommodation block, watching him throughout the day.

“When I walk somewhere they humiliate me and say this is the consequences of your actions, you should not have testified,” he said.

“At night, I cannot sleep in here. Every single moment I think that someone might kill me. Every time I hear someone pass, I hear footsteps, I am alert, I think someone is coming to do something to me.”

In Australia, supporters and friends of Satah have begun a petition through change.org calling for him to be moved to Australia.



“Since [Satah’s] testimony he has been subject to death threats from the Manus Island guards. Additionally, every day guards spend several hours each morning watching him through the window of his room in an attempt to intimidate him. He has genuine fears for his safety and, in spite of promises from the PNG court, is not being protected,” the petition says.

“We ask that Benham Satah be brought immediately to Australia and settled in the community. We believe that justice can only exist where witnesses are protected and that Behnam cannot be protected in PNG.”

The petition has attracted more than 13,000 signatures. It is Australian government policy that no asylum seeker who comes to Australia by boat will ever be settled in Australia, though almost half of the people who arrived on the same boat as Satah are currently living in Australia.

External to Satah’s safety concerns, the trial of the two men alleged to have killed Barati has been mired in controversy, and has now been stalled for months.

Approaching the second anniversary of Barati’s death, only Joshua Kaluvia and Louie Efi, both 29, have ever been arrested or charged with his death, despite significant evidence up to 15 people were involved in killing him.

Kaluvia and Efi are alleged to have been ringleaders in the violence on 17 February.

But they have pleaded not guilty and told Guardian Australia from Lorengau prison they were not involved. “We don’t trust what is happening to us, we don’t trust we will get a fair trial ... we did not commit this crime,” Efi said.

The trial concluded on 29 September, but days later, Kirriwom took the extraordinary decision to re-open the trial, after receiving a letter from the two accused arguing their constitutional right to a fair trial had been breached because the state-appointed public solicitor running their defence called no witnesses other than them.



The trial will reportedly re-open early in 2016 to hear further evidence, though it is not known when it will restart, or who Kaluvia and Efi will call in their defence.

Beyond Kaluvia and Efi’s defence, the trial has been controversial because, despite substantial evidence up to 15 people were involved in killing Barati, including expatriate employees of the detention centre, only the two PNG men have been charged.

One witness statement provided to police says: “Reza Barati was bleeding very heavily from the injury on head. I saw Reza Barati was still alive at that time when he was lying on the wire floor. The G4S guards who were chasing him from behind reached him and kicked him [Barati] on his head with their boots. I saw about a total of 13 G4S local officers and two expatriate officers kicked Reza Barati in his head with their boots. He was putting up his hands trying to block the blows from the boots.”

At least two expatriate guards have been named in statements to police. They cannot be named for legal reasons, but their identities are known to police. They were taken from Manus Island following the riots.

“They want to convict us so that nobody else, no Australians or New Zealanders who are responsible, have to face justice,” Kaluvia said from Lorengau prison. “We have to take the blame for them because we are PNG. They think we don’t matter.”

Manus MP Ronnie Knight, says the limited prosecution highlights a legal double standard: “One law for the locals, and no laws for the expats. The locals don’t matter, and the expats get off, they can do what they like.”

Apparent impunity for expatriate workers on Manus Island has been the source of continuing and escalating tension on the island.

Following an alleged drugging and gang rape of a local woman by Wilson Security employees in July, three suspects were quickly flown off the island and out of PNG police jurisdiction, despite calls for them to be returned, and reported promises from detention centre operator Broadspectrum, that they would be sent back.

In December, an Australian detention centre worker is alleged to have robbed a local bar of beer and cigarettes and then crashed a car in his attempt to flee. He, too, was flown off the island before police could speak with him.