Robert Cornall makes recommendations aimed at boosting security – all of which Scott Morrison says he has accepted

No single party was directly to blame for the two nights of violence that led to the death of the Iranian asylum seeker Reza Barati at Manus detention centre, according to a long-awaited government-commissioned review.



The Cornall review, which places significant emphasis on the conduct of asylum seekers in the runup to the unrest, took more than three months to complete and involved interviews with four asylum seekers, detention centre staff, department officials and the immigration minister, Scott Morrison.

It contains many details of the February unrest already reported by media and a detailed, first-hand account of the death of Barati, described in the report as a “very gentle person”.

It also makes 13 recommendations, predominantly geared towards increasing security in the centre, all of which Morrison says he has accepted.

“It is not possible to isolate one factor which, if handled differently, may have resulted injuries and damage or to apportion blame for causing the incidents directly to one or more of the parties involved,” ex-civil servant Robert Cornall writes in the review, which has been released with few redactions.

The report contains the most detailed account yet of 23-year-old Barati’s death, with a number of witnesses reporting that he was set upon by local contractors and Australian staff. One states that the final blow was delivered by a PNG national working for the Salvation Army. These allegations were reported by Guardian Australia in March.

Speaking at a press conference in Canberra, Morrison said: “Other individuals including a G4S security contractor, it is alleged, were involved in rushing past him and kicking him and then a rock was dropped on Mr Barati's head."

A doctor treating Barati said his injuries were so severe that he would not have survived even with the “best available medical care”.

The asylum seeker was taken to a makeshift hospital on a concrete wharf near the detention centre, where he was “bleeding from the back of his skull on to the ground”, the doctor who treated him said.

“Mr Barati’s head was shattered by a crack on the left side of his skull … He also had facial abrasions and knocks indicating he had received a more general beating (not just the blow to the skull),” a medical officer told Cornall.

Cornall interviewed an asylum seeker who saw the attack but had declined to speak to Papua New Guinean police without his Australian lawyer present.

“I don’t feel safe. I feel they [the PNG police] want to kill me,” the witness told the review.

Guardian Australia understands some asylum seekers have since spoken to PNG police.

The actions of the PNG mobile squad police unit also came under scrutiny, with Cornall accepting a key conclusion of a submission by the security contractor G4S to the review, that the police stormed into the centre uninvited after 11pm. It was reported by ABC’s Four Corners that G4S, the British-based company which managed the detention centre at the time, had invited the police to take over management of centre.

The review notes, as Guardian Australia reported in February, that PNG police had been invited into the centre earlier in the evening by G4S and that a G4S manager had “lost control” of her local employees, who dispersed into the compound during the violence.

Cornall writes: “It could be argued that, if the mobile squad had remained outside the centre then the transferees would not have been assaulted by some PNG nationals and some expats who entered Mike compound with the police when they breached the fence.”

But he continues: “However, that conclusion requires considerable speculation about how the incident on 17-18 February 2014 may have progressed if it had gone unchecked.”

Guardian Australia understands no PNG police or local contractors were interviewed as part of the review process.

The report was conducted with the assistance of five officers from the Department of Immigration and Border Protection. Cornall is a retired public servant and has previously told Guardian Australia there is no cause to doubt his independence.

Principal causes of the unrest are outlined as asylum seekers’ anger at being settled in PNG rather than in Australia, and frustration about the constant uncertainty about their future and how long they would be at the processing centre.

The review says “many” of camp’s population did not take part in the peaceful protests leading up to the unrest and that some were “bullied” into taking part in protests on 16-18 February. It notes substantial tension between local staff and detainees.

“A number of interviewees commented on the Iranians’ superior attitude towards other transferees and PNG nationals, describing them as centre bullies,” Cornall writes.

But Cornall notes that the “belligerent attitude” of some asylum seekers on the second night of violence could be attributed to “the injuries inflicted on transferees by PNG nationals” the night before. One of these injuries was a cut throat.

One asylum seeker told Cornall that when a group of detainees tried to escape the compound on the first night of violence, their intention was “to go to church and pray and ask Jesus Christ to help us”. Cornall continues: “But he was caught by G4S guards and assaulted.”

The opposition immigration spokesman, Richard Marles, said it was “patently clear” that the government was not able to guarantee the safety of asylum seekers on Manus. He questioned what information the immigration minister had about the risk of “imminent violence” at the time of the unrest, which he said the report did not address.

“It is this government which utterly dropped the ball in negotiation with the PNG government about the resettlements agreement that the former Labor government struck,” he said.

The report also raised concerns that the incoming contractor, Transfield, may still be employing some expat PNG staff that “may have been involved in serious assaults on, or other offences against, transferees” during the unrest. It adds this will make it difficult for the company and could tarnish its reputation with asylum seekers. It recommends it consider whether it had “unwittingly engaged” employees who may have been involved in violence.

Cornall also recommends better training for local employees, a “comprehensive” liaison program with locals living near the centre, and that processing of asylum seekers on Manus occurs “as quickly as possible”.

Morrison said many of the recommendations to bolster security were being implemented at the time of the unrest. At a press conference in Canberra he conceded that the PNG police’s response to the unrest was disproportionate but appeared to place some blame on the conduct of asylum seekers.

"We took every action we could as quickly as we could. But it is my great regret that some of those actions weren't able to be implemented in time,” Morrison said.

The Greens’ immigration spokeswoman, Sarah Hanson-Young, said the immigration minister should resign as a result of the report.

“Criticising the very people who had their throats slit by machetes while they ran for their lives was deceitful and grotesquely insensitive,” the senator said.

“The Abbott government repeatedly ignored warnings from service providers on the island about rising tensions and a lack of security but, tragically, those concerns were ignored.

“This report makes it clear that Scott Morrison should resign as the minister for immigration.”

Many asylum seekers told Cornall through feedback forms they could no longer sleep at night since the violence. “In some cases,” Cornall writes, “this anxiety was at such a level they reported they no longer slept at night, only during daylight.”