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Asylum seeker children 'self-harming' in Australia
Asylum seeker children are attempting self-harm and even suicide in an Australian immigration detention centre, a key medical group representative said Saturday.
Australia has a policy of mandatory detention for all asylum seekers who arrive by boat, and while Canberra is attempting to place all children and families in community housing, some remain locked up.
The result is that some children under the age of 10 living in a detention centre in Darwin are presenting to doctors after trying to hurt themselves, the Australian Medical Association's Northern Territory chief Paul Bauert said.
"We have had children under the age of 10 attempting self-harm," the doctor told AFP. "There's definitely been cases of attempted suicide and even cases of some young children taking up hunger strikes. There's been some close calls."
The government has pledged to move all children out of detention by the end of next month but Bauert said the transfer was not happening fast enough.
He said children who experienced hardship and stress in their first years often carried it with them for the rest of their lives, and he urged the government to release all children from detention immediately.
"We know that 95 percent of these kids are going to end up Australian citizens and what we are doing is damaging them," he said.
"It's just not the Australian way."
Rights groups have criticised Australia's system of mandatory detention for asylum seekers awaiting processing, with the nation's Human Rights Commission last week warning suicide and depression were major concerns in the centres.
Bauert's comments are also backed by those of former Australian human rights commissioner Sev Ozdowski who has described the impact of detention on children as tragic, saying some had developed mental illness from the experience.
More than 6,800 asylum seekers, mostly from Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, Iran and Iraq, arrived in Australia in 2010 and hundreds more have arrived this year.
All are held in detention until their claims are assessed, a process which can take more than a year.