4 Dec 2012

Australia's Human Rights Commission to check Nauru asylum seeker detention centre

3:26 pm on 4 December 2012

Australia's Human Rights Commission says it has received ministerial approval for a trip to Nauru to check on the treatment of asylum seekers on the island.

Nearly 400 asylum seekers are detained in tents on Nauru awaiting processing for refugee status in Australia.

Sally Round reports.

"The Commission says Australia's Immigration Minister Chris Bowen has given his approval for a visit by the Commission's president Professor Gillian Triggs. But the Commission says there are still logistics to work through with the government before the trip is on. Professor Trigg's visit would come hard on the heels of a damning report of conditions in the Nauru camp by Amnesty International which visited two weeks ago. Meanwhile the Commission is trying to keep tabs on Omid Sorouseh, who was airlifted from Nauru to a Brisbane hospital on Saturday. He needed more treatment after starving himself for more than fifty days in protest at Australia's offshore processing policy. The Princess Alexandra Hospital says he is no longer in its wards but the Australian government says it will not release details of his whereabouts or condition for privacy reasons."