TONY EASTLEY: Australian Immigration officials have been telling more than 2,000 asylum seekers held on Christmas Island that they have a choice - return to their country of origin or face indefinite detention.

It's not clear what their response has been but in Darwin, where more than 1000 people are living in four separate detention centres, some detainees are prepared to remain locked up rather than face persecution or even death in their country of origin.

From Darwin, this report from Michael Coggan:

(Sound of people speaking together)

MICHAEL COGGAN: Every Thursday evening members of the Darwin Asylum Seeker Support Network, DASSAN, gather outside the Airport Lodge immigration detention centre, just hundreds of metres from Darwin's Airport terminal.

They set up protest placards and talk through a cyclone wire fence to the men, women and children living in converted shipping containers at the centre.

Peter Robson is a member of DASSAN.

PETER ROBSON: What we've seen is a move away from a decision where people are having their claims assessed to one where people are completely without any idea about what's going to happen to them.

MICHAEL COGGAN: Last night a crowd of asylum seekers came to the fence as I approached with a camera crew.

(Question to asylum seeker) What will you do if you are sent to Nauru or to Christmas Island, or to Manus Island? Will you just stay there or will you have to go home?

ASYLUM SEEKER 1: I have no home right now. Where should I live? I should live in Afghanistan? I have never seen Afghanistan.

(Sound of woman crying and speaking)

TRANSLATOR: She said they brought her here for just for her treatment but her family, they're in Christmas and she don't want to stay here.

MICHAEL COGGAN: Many of the people I spoke to have been brought to Darwin from Christmas Island for medical treatment. They're from Afghanistan, Vietnam, Lebanon, Iran and Iraq.

ASYLUM SEEKER 2: If they tell us we're going to stay here for a year, two years, five years we don't have problem. But they don't tell us. And maybe, before I came here in Christmas Island my transfer was cancelled three times.

MICHAEL COGGAN: Several of the women have recently given birth or are about to have a child. Peter Robson says four women who had recently given birth were sent offshore with little notice.

PETER ROBSON: What we do know is that they were woken up at 5am, they were ushered out of their rooms. They had an opportunity to make a phone call which is why we know what happened to them and then they were simply put on a plane and taken to Christmas Island.

MICHAEL COGGAN: Some of the asylum seekers I spoke to knew they wouldn't be allowed to stay in Australia but said they'd be prepared to stay in detention indefinitely rather than face death in their country of origin.

Not one of the more than 10 asylum seekers I spoke to knows what is going to happen to them.

(Sound of man speaking)

TRANSLATOR: He says I am afraid from Serco, they knock my door and they tell me just get back to Christmas Island.

MICHAEL COGGAN: Under the new Federal Government any asylum seeker who arrives by boat after the 19th of July could be sent offshore for indefinite detention or returned to their country of origin.

Several of the people I spoke to didn't want to return to the Christmas Island detention centre because they say it's overcrowded, there aren't enough toilets for everyone and people have to line up for hours to get a meal.

The Immigration Minister Scott Morrison is expected to have his say on the situation when he delivers his weekly briefing later today.

TONY EASTLEY: Michael Coggan.