{"id":73075,"date":"2025-07-26T00:00:29","date_gmt":"2025-07-25T15:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2025\/jul\/25\/tuvalu-climate-visas-building-a-life-in-australia"},"modified":"2025-07-26T00:00:29","modified_gmt":"2025-07-25T15:00:29","slug":"bateteba-left-what-once-felt-like-the-safest-place-in-the-world-to-build-a-life-in-australia-thousands-hope-to-follow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/?p=73075","title":{"rendered":"Bateteba left what once felt like \u2018the safest place in the world\u2019 to build a life in Australia. Thousands hope to follow"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>With more than 80% of Tuvalu\u2019s population applying for \u2018climate visas\u2019, the tiny South Pacific island nation\u2019s Australian diaspora is only set to grow<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<p>Get our <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/email-newsletters?CMP=cvau_sfl\">breaking news email<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/app.adjust.com\/w4u7jx3\">free app<\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/australia-news\/series\/full-story?CMP=cvau_sfl\">daily news podcast<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Bateteba Aselu describes her former life in Tuvalu as like living in the \u201csafest place in the world\u201d where the community looked out for each other, there was no homelessness and you rarely heard the sirens of police or ambulances.<\/p>\n<p>But rising sea levels and extreme weather have created such an immediate existential threat to the tiny South Pacific island nation that when a new <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/2025\/jun\/20\/tuvalu-climate-crisis-australia-visa-ballot\">visa lottery to migrate<\/a> to Australia closed last Friday, 8,750 people in 2,474 family groups \u2013 more than 80% of Tuvalu\u2019s population of 11,000 residents \u2013 had applied for the world\u2019s first \u201cclimate visas\u201d.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2025\/jul\/25\/tuvalu-climate-visas-building-a-life-in-australia\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>With more than 80% of Tuvalu\u2019s population applying for \u2018climate visas\u2019, the tiny South Pacific island nation\u2019s Australian diaspora is only set to growGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastBateteba Aselu describes her former life in&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4864,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sns_share_botton_hide":"","vkExUnit_sns_title":"","_vk_print_noindex":"","sitemap_hide":"","_veu_custom_css":"","veu_display_promotion_alert":"","vkexunit_cta_each_option":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[41,43,388,2331,65,680,282,563,1342],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-73075","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-asia-pacific","category-australia-news","category-australian-immigration-and-asylum","category-climate-crisis","category-environment","category-queensland","category-south-pacific","category-tuvalu","category-victoria"],"aioseo_notices":[],"veu_head_title_object":{"title":"","add_site_title":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73075","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4864"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=73075"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73075\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":73076,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73075\/revisions\/73076"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=73075"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=73075"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=73075"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}