There is an article about police storming the Aboriginal tent embassy yesterday to pick up someone who, it is alleged, had stolen some emblems from a public building and not kept a court date.
If the place was really an embassy then the police would not have any rights to enter the territory as it would actually be foreign soil on which they have no jurisdiction. Since Australian indigenous people claim that they own Australia anyway it is ridiculous that they should create an 'embassy' to a government that they don't actually recognise which exists on what they claim is their own soil. It is even more ridiculous to claim embassy status in a situation where the people who live there have no "government" to represent.
Apart from being an eye sore outside on the grounds of the old Parliament House and a curiosity for the Japanese tourists who crowd around and take pictures what good does this 'embassy' do? Who does it serve? What message does it convey to anyone?
I am not hostile to indigenous peoples in this country. I just think that this particular expression of their sovereignty is counter-productive.
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The message it conveys to me is "Lest We Forget".
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