Australia told detention of child asylum-seekers is abuse

Refugee advocates have criticized the Australian Government for sending 73 unaccompanied child asylum seekers to a remote detention centre in rural Western Australia.

A plane carrying 36 teenage boys seeking asylum landed in the remote town after the Australian Government decided to use the town's detention centre to hold unaccompanied youths.

The boys, aged 14 to 17, are believed to be mostly from Afghanistan. Another 37 asylum seeker children will also be flown to the centre.

The Australian Government had planned to send the teenage boys to Malaysia for processing as part of a deal between Malaysia and Australia. But the High Court rejected this plan because Malaysia has not signed the UN's refugee convention.

According to recent statistics from the Australian Department of Immigration the majority of children currently in detention come from Iran and Afghanistan. 246 children have come from Iran and 187 from Afghanistan.

The Refugee Rights Action Network says detaining children is a form of child abuse. “We do know as a matter of absolute certainty that children that are held in immigration detention experience levels of depression, of self-harm and of suicide that is never seen in children that are held in the community", they said.

The Australian Medical Association said it was worried about the mental health of detainees, and that children were suffering from depression and self-harm.

"We are aware of a nine-year-old child who was recently admitted for trying to commit suicide," the Association told a committee of Australian politicians investigating the detention system.

They said hospitals had also reported large numbers of adults with mental health problems hurting themselves on purpose and requiring medical treatment.

Australia has a policy of mandatory detention that requires all people arriving in the country without a valid Australian visa to be detained in remote facilities while their applications for asylum are assessed. Some people wait for a year or more to find out whether they can stay in Australia or not.

A doctor at the Australian Medical Association has said, "Mandatory detention is medically harmful, violates human rights, has no known beneficial effects and is a waste of money".