Australia shutting a door on asylum

(CNN) -- A riot on a tiny island in the Pacific that killed no one would usually go unnoticed by the world.

But when some 100 asylum seekers burned down their shelters in an Australian refugee processing center Friday on Nauru Island, it did not. Instead, it drew attention to a new restrictive law made in Australia the same day banning "boat people" from living in the country.

"As of today asylum seekers who come here by boat without a visa will never be settled in Australia," said Prime Minister Kevin Rudd

Starting immediately, all "boat people" will be taken to the sparsely populated jungle island of Manus, which is a part of Papua New Guinea.

Nauru Island, where the insurrection broke out, is the epitome of the middle of nowhere.
It is roughly 2,000 miles from Australia's shores, where Rudd said in no uncertain terms that "boat people" are no longer to tread.
There is not much room to roam on Nauru. It is just three miles across at its widest point.
And there are not many people to talk to. The nearly 600 "transferees," as they are called, make up 5% of the island's total population. And they speak various languages from Farsi to Pashtun.
More than 150 miles of open ocean separate them from their nearest neighbor, which is another tiny island.