Show caption ‘I personally witnessed that in Mike compound (one of the four camps of Manus prison), a group of officers attacked people with metal poles and sticks.’ Photograph: AP Opinion There was our silence and their violence as Manus camp was evacuated Behrouz Boochani Of all the violence and abuse inflicted on refugees on Manus Island, the emotional trauma is hardest to endure @BehrouzBoochani Thu 30 Nov 2017 17.00 GMT Share on Facebook

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After more than 20 days of resilience in a harsh situation, having no food, water and medication, refugees in Manus prison were forced to a new camp. The transfer was conducted by absolute force and, as always, the Australian government denies the truth and has declared it a “voluntary and peaceful” transfer.

Conversely, what we experienced – and what the huge volume of footage and photos distributed in the news and social media reveal – is something different from the government’s claim.

A day before the “massive transfer”, while I was handcuffed and kept at the back of the prison, I personally witnessed that in Mike compound (one of the four camps of Manus prison), a group of officers attacked people with metal poles and sticks and, after just a few minutes, forced 40 refugees onto two buses and transferred them to the new camp using violence. They dragged one of the refugees while he was vomiting. After a while, he was transferred by an ambulance. He stayed at a local medical centre for three days and rumours about his death spread around the camp, making us dreadfully worried.

Mike compound was shut violently, and officers raided other camps and besieged Fox compound to give them more control over the situation. One of the refugees who was moved to the new camps along with 40 others described what had happened:

When they attacked, I hid under one of the containers for a few hours, I was trapped by fear. In the darkness of the night, when police and locals were transferring people, or more precisely, were plundering refugees’ belongings, I was found by police’s dog and dragged out violently by police.

This setting reminds me of the 2014 riot more than anything. It reminds me of absolute brutality in Mike compound when Australian officers, along with locals, attacked and Reza Barati was murdered. Every person’s life matters. I vividly remember that some of the refugees had been hiding under the containers due to well-founded fear for 48 hours. They were about to faint when they got out.

Papua New Guinea police move to clear Manus detention centre – video

What is obvious is that the violence has not only been physical; it has been a series of actions conducted by police and immigration officers, from filling our well with rubbish and damaging our water tank to destroying our personal belongings and removing our beds and shelters; all happening in front of our eyes while we watched them silently.

Their verbal abuse, addressing us with insulting terms, was their tactic to try to provoke us to become like them; become violent. But from our long experience of living in the prison camp we knew that we would continue to watch them and only watch them in deep silence.

It was sunset when the Mike compound was shut and there were still 300 people in the camp. Next day, early in the morning, they returned. Metal poles in hand, they entered the camp and called out the names of some of the refugees, supposedly “the leaders,” telling them to identify themselves.

Once again there was our silence and their violence; they attacked the men who were gathered in Delta compound, beating the men with hands, feet, wooden sticks and whatever was available to them, and in minutes forced the men to get into the buses. When the four buses arrived in Lorengau after driving 24km, dozens of men appeared out of the buses with bruises and blood on their bodies. Men were scared but, more than this, were traumatised. There is one reflection that has been communicated between all: it is so hard and painful to be beaten and insulted in such a manner after years of imprisonment.

Dozens of men, still traumatised by this violence, were transferred to the East Lorengau camp. This camp has a capacity of 280 people, but by the end of the day they had relocated almost 400 men there. About 60 people remained homeless for two days. Eventually police relocated 25 of these 60 men to a classroom, which the men have had to fit out themselves as best they can in order to sleep there.

When I went to West Haus camp, workers and construction equipment were still operating. A large number of containers were distributed throughout a field the size of a soccer pitch in the middle of a jungle. Last night it rained, creating red mud throughout the camp, making it difficult to walk. It was like hell created for the “exiled dangerous criminals”.

I saw a large number of relocated men with bruises and wounds on their bodies, clearly caused by their recent beatings with metal poles. I visited a man, semi-naked and with bare feet, sitting in the dirt. His face was bloody. I spoke with him, but he was completely silent. Others told me that police had beaten him, he had lost his personal belongings, and they killed his dog that had been living with him. Witnessing this man’s story was too much to bear.

I went to Hillside camp. It is in the middle of a tropical forest, but they cut all the trees and built the camp there. There is no electricity and water there yet. Workers are still constructing the buildings. It is a metal structure at the top of a small hill. There also I became so depressed and disappointed. On the same day, Medecins Sans Frontieres were at Manus prison, with doctors trying to see the injured refugees but the immigration officials did not approve or permit them to enter the prison.

The Australian and PNG governments eventually succeeded in shutting the Lombrum camp by force. Really, they have only succeeded in transferring this long lasting problem 24km away.

This is the reality of life for men in these Manus camps. They have entered into another stage of suffering and this new phase means living without security. The internal suffering, the emotional trauma, is the hardest to endure. There are no psychiatric facilities in Manus, but there is more need now than ever before as the men feel that they have been abandoned; they are desperate, lonely. The feeling of isolation has surrounded them and I am worried.