Behrouz Boochani, an asylum seeker on Manus Island, wins Australia’s top literary prize

Behrouz Boochani, a Kurdish-Iranian journalist, has been held on Manus Island since 2013 after being plucked off a boat bound for Australia

He has been a prominent critic of the treatment of people under Australia’s hardline immigration policy

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Behrouz Boochani, 35, has been held on Manus Island since 2013. Photo: AFP

Published: 8:30pm, 3 Feb 2019Updated: 9:56am, 4 Feb 2019

The winner of Australia’s top literary prize wrote his novel on his mobile phone and delivered it one chapter at a time via WhatsApp.

Behrouz Boochani, a Kurdish-Iranian who has been held on Papua New Guinea’s Manus Island since he was plucked off a refugee boat on its way to Australia in 2013, won the A$100,000 (US$72,390) Victorian Prize for literature on 31 January for his debut novel No Friends but the Mountains: Writing From Manus Prison.

“With humility, I would like to say that this award is a victory. It is a victory not only for us, but for literature and art and above all, it is a victory for humanity,” he said in pre-recorded acceptance speech given to media. “A victory against a system that has never recognised us as human beings. It is a victory against a system that has reduced us to numbers.”

Boochani, who is not allowed to enter Australia, hoped the prize would focus attention on the plight of more than 1,000 people in Australia’s offshore camps.

The award puts an uncomfortable, renewed spotlight at the ongoing treatment of asylum seekers by the governments of Nauru and Papua New Guinea on behalf of Australia.

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