Hunger strikes by protesting asylum seekers spread today to a fourth Australian detention centre while refugee activists took to the streets of the country's two largest cities to call for greater compassion.
An Immigration Department spokesman said 17 people at the Port Hedland refugee camp in Western Australia began to refuse food and water in a copycat protest to mirror 12 days of turmoil at another camp in the baking heat of the interior.
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A street protester last week
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"Seventeen detainees are currently participating in a hunger strike at Port Hedland", he said.
Four of Australia's six detention centres for illegal immigrants are now in the grip of protests since around 200 at Woomera, 475 km north of Adelaide, began sewing their lips shut and trying to commit suicide 12 days ago.
The mainly Afghan and Middle Eastern asylum seekers are protesting at the months it takes to process refugee claims.
The Immigration Department spokesman said an illegal immigrant who had thrown himself onto a razor wire fence at Woomera yesterday was being monitored in hospital.
He added that three children had been taken to hospital overnight for observation as almost 200 Woomera inmates continued their hunger strike. Some have tried to hang themselves and others have swallowed shampoo and painkillers.
Around 8,000 asylum seekers have arrived in Australia over the past two years, a trickle according to the United Nations.
Refugee groups today demonstrated in Sydney and Melbourne in sympathy with the detainees at Woomera, some 35 of whom still had their mouths symbolically sewn shut with a strand of thread.
"This just shows the level of desperation, these people just got nothing to lose, they are throwing themselves on razor wire", said Ms Judy McVey of the Refugee Action Collective in Melbourne.
She said 200 people demonstrated outside the Maribyrnonga detention centre in the southern city where dozens of asylum seekers and visa over-stayers have staged a sympathy hunger strike.
In Sydney, another 200 activists rallied peacefully outside the Villawood detention centre. The immigration spokesman said detainees there were not refusing water or food.