Asylum seekers self-immolate to reach Australia, says minister

Australia's immigration minister, Peter Dutton, has accused asylum seekers of making false allegations of sexual assault and self-harming – including by setting themselves on fire – in order to get to Australia.

On Thursday, Mr Dutton dismissed the revelations contained in the Nauru files published by the Guardian – leaked documents on conditions in the country's detention camp on the Pacific island – which contain graphic reports of sexual assault, child abuse and self-harm written by detention centre staff, and said: "Most of that's been reported on before."

He said: “I won’t tolerate any sexual abuse whatsoever. But I have been made aware of some incidents that have been reported, false allegations of sexual assault, because in the end people have paid money to people smugglers and they want to come to our country.

“Some people have even gone to the extent of self-harming and people have self-immolated in an effort to get to Australia, and certainly some have made false allegations in an attempt to get to Australia.”

Mr Dutton’s comments were the first he has made since the publication of more than 2,000 leaked incident reports from the Nauru detention centre.

Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young said Mr Dutton’s comments were abhorrent.

“Comments by minister Dutton this morning that incidents involving child sexual abuse may be fabricated are abhorrent. To attack a child for telling an adult – someone they should trust – that they’ve been abused is unthinkable.

“It is unacceptable for the Turnbull government to continue to send people to an island prison in which we know children are experiencing abuse and violence.”

Mr Dutton’s comments follow a commitment from the opposition Labor party to reintroduce a private member’s Bill to Australia’s parliament to impose mandatory reporting of child abuse in offshore immigration detention after the leaked reports detailed systemic abuse of children.

Labor, which reopened Nauru and Manus – the other offshore island, in Papua New Guinea – and supports offshore processing as a policy platform, stopped short of calling for Australia’s offshore detention camps to be closed. It said a royal commission into the abuses into detention was not needed.

Two UN bodies - Unicef and and the UN's high commissioner for refugees – have called for all asylum seekers and refugees to be removed from offshore detention, while Gillian Triggs, the president of the Australian Human Rights Commission, said an Australian royal commission could investigate "matters in which Australia is internationally responsible".

Guardian service