The detained immigrant, known to the court as ASF17, has taken his legal bid for freedom to the High Court in a case that could determine the fates of hundreds of indefinitely detained immigrants and government policy.
Authorities have continuously attempted to deport him to Iran every six months since 2018, when his asylum seeker visa was refused.
But as a bisexual man, ASF17 could face the death penalty upon return.
Lisa De Ferrari said Australia had forced her client to remain in detention indefinitely. (David Crosling/AAP PHOTOS)
"Take me back to where you picked me up in the high seas, even take me to Gaza," the asylum seeker said during a Federal Court cross-examination, his lawyers recalled on Wednesday.
"I have a better chance there of not being killed than if you take me to Iran."
However, Australia has not offered other options, forcing him to remain in detention indefinitely, which his lawyer Lisa De Ferrari called punitive.
"It was never necessary to keep our client in detention only to ask in six months if he is going to change his mind," she told the High Court.
"They've straitjacketed themselves and now they're turning the table on my client, saying 'you've been very unreasonable by not helping us get you to Iran'.
"How can it not be punitive (when) there's never any end point?"
His case springs from an November High Court ruling, which found it was unlawful to indefinitely detain people with no prospect of deportation.
About 150 immigration detainees were released as a result.
The 37-year-old appellant wants this expanded to cover people who refuse to co-operate with authorities on their deportation.
ASF17 first arrived on Australian shores by boat in 2013 and has been in detention ever since his bridging visa was cancelled in 2014.
Clare O'Neil said the Commonwealth should retain its power to detain people in these circumstances. (Lukas Coch/AAP PHOTOS)
Home Affairs Minister Clare O'Neil said the government had argued this person should remain in detention and the Commonwealth should retain its power to detain people in these circumstances.
"We are prepared for every eventuality in terms of what decision is made ... but please understand at the moment we are empowered to keep that person in detention and he is in detention because of our decisions," she told Sunrise before the hearing.
There are about 200 other people in a similar situation, a number of whom are suspected to have had their protection claims refused under a visa "fast-track" process.
The scheme will be abolished on July 1 but the Human Rights Law Centre accused the government of failing to help those refused visas under it.
Sanmati Verma, a legal director at the law centre, said the government was using indefinite detention as a way to "coerce people into returning to danger".
"People in detention are deprived of their freedom, separated from their families and communities and routinely subjected to violence, isolation and deplorable conditions," she said
"Indefinite immigration detention can never be the answer."
The High Court case could also impact another 4000 people.
Before the hearing, the government tried to ram through laws to prevent a mass release of people from immigration detention.
Under the proposed laws, those who refuse to co-operate with the government over their deportation - which includes those on some bridging visas - could spend up to five years in prison.
The legislation would give the home affairs minister unilateral power to ban visa classes of relatives of asylum seekers who come from blacklisted countries that do not accept deportees.
But it was blocked by an unlikely union between the coalition, the Greens and the crossbench, and sent to a senate inquiry.
Lifeline 13 11 14
Fullstop Australia 1800 385 578
