Controversies over abuses in Australia’s offshore detention regime could harm its multimillion-dollar bid for a seat on the UN’s Human Rights Council.

Nauru whistleblowers have told a global women’s event in New York that Australia should be blocked from winning a seat on the influential UN body, because of systemic physical and sexual abuse in the island camps, and the international law violations of its indefinite detention regime.

Speaking at the Women in the World conference in New York – between the Scottish first minister, Nicola Sturgeon, and the former US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton – Nauru whistleblowers Viktoria Vibhakar and Alanna Maycock detailed abuses they witnessed in the camps and said Australia’s attempt to secure a seat on the council was inconsistent with running an offshore detention regime.

“The Australian government could demonstrate its respect for human rights by evacuating these camps and bringing people to safety,” Vibhakar said. “If they were to do so, we would all applaud and support their bid. But this [human rights] council is supposed to protect and promote the very same human rights laws that Australian government’s detention camps so flagrantly violate.

“I have seen the human rights violations myself, I have given hundreds of documents recording abuse to inquiries – the government cannot say it is unaware of the harm being perpetrated against people in these camps.

“How can Australia’s bid be taken seriously in the face of such ongoing and unlawful treatment of vulnerable people?”

Jennifer Robinson, Australian human rights lawyer and co-founder of the Hakawati Project, said Australia’s offshore detention regime had already been criticised by the council. But she said Australia was acutely sensitive to international pressure, especially as the council vote approached.

“I think there’s hope for change … Australia reacts to international pressure.”

At the council’s universal periodic review of Australia in 2015, when more than 100 countries commented on the country’s human rights record, many were critical of offshore detention.

Other arms of the UN, including the special rapporteur on the human rights of migrants, and the UN committee against torture, have criticised offshore detention as unlawful.

Australia will compete with Spain and France for two seats on the council in elections in November. The successful nations will earn a seat on the 47-member council for three years from 2018. Australia has a solid chance of being elected, particularly given no country from the Pacific has ever sat on the council.

Lobbying for a seat in a speech to the council in February, the minister for international development and the Pacific, Concetta Fierravanti-Wells, said Australia’s bid for a council seat, its first, reflected a “commitment to advance human rights”.

“It is more important than ever for nations like Australia to ensure that human rights remain a fundamental pillar of our foreign policy and global outreach.

“We see holding a seat on the council as bearing a significant responsibility: a responsibility to work with partners to address international human rights violations; to stand up for universal values globally and in Australia; and to hold those responsible for violations to account – especially in grave situations of human rights abuses, such as North Korea and Syria.”

Fierravanti-Wells said Australia would promote the empowerment of women and girls, as well as freedom of expression, good governance, the rights of Indigenous people and strong national human rights institutions.

The council is not without controversy. Current members include Egypt, China, Cuba and Saudi Arabia, all countries with their own human rights abuses – including extrajudicial executions, arbitrary imprisonment and restrictions on freedoms of association, religion and speech.