A Sri Lankan asylum-seeker has died after setting himself on fire while awaiting a visa decision in Australia, Immigration Minister Scott Morrison said Monday, with a Tamil group claiming he was “living in great fear”.
Leorsin Seemanpillai, 29, who was living in Geelong, outside Melbourne, after being granted a temporary visa a year ago, suffered burns to 90 percent of his body after the incident on Saturday morning.
He died on Sunday in a Melbourne hospital.
“This man sadly died as a result of a very serious set of injuries that were self-inflicted,” Morrison said.
“And I don´t think we are in any position, and I frankly don´t think anyone else is any position, to draw any conclusions about what is a person´s mind in that situation.”
Aran Mylvaganam of the Tamil Refugee Council, who was at Seemanpillai´s bedside in hospital and knew him for a year, said he was “living in great fear” of being sent back to Sri Lanka, where he believed his life would be in danger.
