Cornelia Rau isn't the only person who deserves an apology

  Federal treasurer Peter Costello has offered the apology to Cornelia Rau that Prime Minister John Howard still can't bring himself to make.

Rau certainly deserves an apology and seems to be getting one because she is an Australian. But if we treated someone from another country the same way wouldn't they deserve better too?

Rau was treated appallingly. This woman, who suffers from schizophrenia was reported missing from a psychiatric hospital 10 months ago. Yet when the authorities found her, she was locked up in a maximum security detention centre and held in solitary confinement because the government mistakenly believed she was an illegal migrant from Germany.

The image above of Baxter Detention Centre is from Oxfam