Australia denies Cambodia refugee deal in jeopardy

Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop told reporters in Sydney on Monday that the deal agreed last year, in which Canberra is to pay the Cambodian government A$ 40 million (25.4 million euros, $28.5 million) in return for taking in some refugees from its detention camp at Nauru, remained in tact.

"Canada is committed to a regional solution and has committed through a memorandum of understanding with the Australian government to resettle some asylum seekers who are found to be genuine refugees," Bishop said.

"It wishes to harness the skills of foreign workers and in this way, they can resettle people into Cambodia and help boost their GDP."

However, the deal does not specify how many refugees Cambodia needs to resettle in order to qualify for the aid, and so far only four people - three Iranians and a Rohingya man have arrived in the country under the program. The three are reported to be living in a villa in Phom Penh provided by the International Organization for Migration and paid for by the Australian government.

Bishop's statement came in response to comments made by a Cambodian interior ministry spokesman.

"We have no plans to receive more refugees from Nauru," the spokesman; General Khieu Sopheak told the Reuters news agency.

"With the situation of our country like this, we can't receive hundreds or thousands of them. The less we receive, the better."

Back in Canberra, the opposition seized on the general's comments to criticize the deal, with Richard Marles, the Labor Party's spokesman on immigration policy describing it as "an expensive joke."

pfd/jil (Reuters, dpa)