Mr Hammer
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Half of all Australians want to ban Muslim immigration: poll
Mark Kenny, Michael Koziol
US President Barack Obama has hit back strongly at rising anti-immigration sentiment across America, Europe and Australia, as a new poll found half of all Australians want to ban Muslim immigration. Declaring rich countries must do more not less, and that refugees are victims rather than the causes of violence, Mr Obama said governments proposing to build walls and close doors inevitably imprisoned their own citizens while ensuring they would be harshly judged by history.
Barack Obama's final UN address President Barack Obama delivered his final address to the UN General Assembly where he focused much of his speech on rejecting fundamentalism and embracing tolerance across the globe. "This crisis is a test of our common humanity - whether we give in to suspicion and fear and build walls, or whether we see ourselves in another," he said. It came as an Essential Research poll released on Wednesday found 49 per cent of Australians support a ban on Muslim immigration, including 60 per cent of Coalition voters, 40 per cent of Labor voters and 34 per cent of Greens voters. Australia to take Central American refugees Could PM's US promise see an end to Manus and Nauru? The most common reasons for wanting a ban were fears over terrorism, and a belief that Muslim migrants do not integrate into society nor share Australian values. The poll was first conducted in early August and then repeated to ensure it was not a rogue. "It's too a big a number to say it's an unrepresentative rump that should be shunned from polite society," Essential pollster Peter Lewis told Fairfax Media. Advertisement
In a strident call for more decisive action to help the world's 65 million asylum seekers and internally displaced persons, the US President used his opening address to an invitation-only summit on refugees in New York to pour scorn on the moral abandon propelling right-wing populists, such as US Rebublican presidential candidate Donald Trump, former UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage and others in Europe, and Australian senator Pauline Hanson. By submitting your email you are agreeing to Fairfax Media's terms and conditions and privacy policy. "It's a test of our international system where all nations ought to share in our collective responsibilities, because the vast majority of refugees are hosted by just 10 countries who are bearing a very heavy burden - among them Turkey, Pakistan, Lebanon, Iran, Ethiopia. Countries that often have fewer resources than many of those who are doing President Barack Obama used his last address to the UN General Assembly to do a stocktake of his presidency while pressing to keep Donald Trump away from the Oval Office. Photo: AP The Essential poll, with a typical sample size of more than 1000, came a week after Senator Hanson's incendiary first speech in the Senate in which she proposed that Australia halt Muslim immigration and stop building mosques and Islamic schools. The poll found a high level of support for the One Nation firebrand, with two-thirds of voters agreeing she talks about issues other politicians are afraid of tackling, and 48 per cent endorsing a national debate about Muslim immigration. In her first speech in the Senate last week, Pauline Hanson said Australia was in danger of being "swamped" by Muslims. Photo: Alex Ellinghausen Mr Lewis said the results showed mainstream political parties needed to re-engage with "outsider politics" as disenfranchised voters flocked to the fringes. "It's consistent with a sense that the fault lines in the current political climate are not between the two major parties - they're between insiders and outsiders," he told Fairfax Media. "If you look at the movements in the States, in Britain, the economic disenfranchisement drives a set of conversations around culture and difference that manifest at the moment in these sorts of positions." If the poll is an accurate reflection of Australian voters, it highlights a significant hardening in anti-Muslim sentiment. A Roy Morgan poll conducted in October last year found broad support for Muslim immigration, with 28 per cent of respondents declaring themselves opposed. The Obama comments came as Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull revealed his government would dial up its refugee intake but was also ratcheting up the pressure on Iran to take back persons deemed not to have legitimate refugee claims, in a bid to clear out the detention centres on Manus Island and Nauru - the blight on Australia's international reputation.
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