10yo pleads for release from asylum detention

Updated

The Immigration Department says it is considering a letter written by a 10-year-old Vietnamese girl appealing for her release after more than a year in detention.

The girl is one of 26 Vietnamese minors who are being detained at the Darwin Airport Lodge, which is being used as an immigration detention centre for children and families.

She says the children are "depressed" and "suffering" in detention, and they do not know who will help them.

Rohan Thwaites, from the Darwin Asylum Seeker Support Network, says even if the Immigration Department is finding it complicated to check their stories, the children should not be in detention.

"A lot of children, including this ten-year-old girl have been locked up for over a year now," he said.

"Whatever they are claiming, whether it be for asylum or otherwise, children should not be locked up in these detention centres."

The girl who wrote the letter has been interned in three different detention centres since arriving in Australia by boat in March last year.

In a translation of her letter she describes living there as "extremely depressing".

"We don't know who will help us."

The girl said their lives were "very sad and hopeless" and they "lack any sense of a future".

"As each day passes, we feel heavy-hearted and lacking any sense of hope," she said.

"We have no way of knowing what our future holds for us."

The Immigration Department says the group of 26 Vietnamese children are being "well cared for".

Mr Thwaites says the Federal Government and public should respond.

"She's hoping, I think as we are, that she can be removed out of detention so that she can start to live in the community and not be subject to incidences of self-harm and suicide and all the other things that come with being detained," he said.

Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young says Immigration Minister Chris Bowen should relinquish his guardianship responsibilities for the unaccompanied minors he is detaining.

"This is an appalling circumstance," she said.

"We have a ten-year-old child pleading for help, not knowing who to turn to, when the Immigration Minister is this girl's legal guardian, the same person who is keeping her locked up almost for a year, a child, a ten-year-old child."

Topics: community-and-society, immigration, children, federal-government, australia, nt, darwin-0800

First posted