New Zealand-born actor Russell Crowe is angry Australia hasn't considered NZ's refugee offer. Photo / Getty
New Zealand-born actor Russell Crowe is angry Australia hasn't considered NZ's refugee offer. Photo / Getty
Kiwi Australian Hollywood star Russell Crowe has slammed Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull for refusing New Zealand's offer to rehome 150 Manus Island and Nauru refugees.
Critics hit out at Crowe for using his profile to denounce Australia's border protection policy as Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern visited Sydney.
Taking to Twitter, Crowe said Australia looks like "a**holes", while hitting out at Australia's treatment of refugees.
"If one of the men on Manus was your brother, your uncle, your Father...your son... The world is watching Australia & we look like a**holes," he wrote.
"Go ahead write stupid articles, send me abuse, call me naive. Doesn't change that what Australia has done to these men on Manus is appalling."
His comments come just days after food, water, medicine and power supplies have been cut off at a Manus Island detention centre. After 24 hours without anything to eat, the remaining 606 detainees are starving. There is no sewage system and the toilets are overflowing.
New Zealand-born actor Russell Crowe is angry Australia hasn't considered NZ's refugee offer. Photo / Getty
All they have is rainwater they have collected in bins, with some said to be adding salt and sugar to preserve it and others digging holes to find something to drink.
The refugees have allegedly been brutally attacked by the Navy and robbed and stabbed by locals.
"Manus. A Nations shame. Lives held in limbo . Lives lived in fear & despair . It's f***ing disgraceful.
"I believe I could house and find jobs for 6. I'm sure there'd be other Australians who would do the same."
New Zealand's newly elected Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has reiterated an offer to take 150 refugees from offshore centres in her first meeting with Malcolm Turnbull. Photo / Getty
New Zealand's offer to accept 150 refugees from Manus Island and Nauru was waved away, with Turnbull saying his government had to first consider its refugee-swap deal with the US.
"In the wake of that, obviously we can consider other ones," he said.
Ardern's relationship with Australia has been controversial since her election, with Foreign Minister Julie Bishop describing the 37-year-old New Zealand leader as "untrustworthy" after an MP from her own Labour Party delved into former deputy PM Barnaby Joyce's dual Kiwi citizenship status.
Fronting the media at Kirribilli House on Sunday, Turnbull didn't completely shut the door on Ms Ardern's offer to resettle the refugees, saying they had engaged in "strong talks".
Some 600 asylum seekers and refugees have barricaded themselves in the Manus Island complex, which officially closed last Tuesday following a Papua New Guinean Supreme Court ruling in April.
Ardern has reiterated the NZ offer, first made under John Key's National government to Australia's previous Labor government in 2013.
