The United Nations' refugee agency criticised Australia today for its tough policy of detaining asylum seekers, despite recent government moves to release children and families from detention.
"The UNHCR believes that detention of asylum seekers and refugees is inherently undesirable," David Wright, regional representative of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, told a parliamentary inquiry.
"Since they have already been through persecution and suffered, they shouldn't be subjected to further persecution and suffering."
Australia has a strict policy of detaining illegal immigrants and asylum seekers, who can spend years at remote detention camps while their claims for refugee status are assessed.
The policy has been at the core of the conservative government's four consecutive election victories. But a revolt by backbench MPs forced it to announce in June that family groups and children would be allowed to live in the community.
Mr Wright said detention should only be used while authorities checked identities, where travel and identification papers had been lost or destroyed, or to protect public security.
He also criticised the government's programme of issuing temporary protection visas, which can be regularly extended but which limit the rights of asylum seekers in Australia.
"The intent of temporary protection was to deal with mass influx situations, not individual or small numbers of arrivals," Mr Wright said, adding that the visas ban people from returning to Australia if they leave the country for any reason.
However, he said the recent changes to allow children and families to live outside of detention camps was a welcome step towards improving the treatment of refugees and asylum seekers.