Australian inquiry told of abuse at Nauru migrant camp

Australian would-be asylum seekers are taken to the Pacific island nation of Nauru

An Australian Senate inquiry has heard allegations of sexual assault and squalid conditions at the offshore migrant detention centre in Nauru.

A Senate committee has begun its first public hearing into the allegations after an independent report found Nauru detainees were being abused.

Australia sends all would-be asylum seekers arriving by boat to Nauru and Papua New Guinea for processing.

The Senate committee will reveal its finding by mid-June.

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott has said the government was doing everything it could to help conditions in centres on Nauru and Manus Island in Papua New Guinea.

However, Australia has been widely criticised by rights groups for its immigration policies of resettling asylum seekers elsewhere.

'Sexual favours'

A number of submissions to the committee from asylum seekers spoke of women not being able to sleep at night because of rats running through tents, according to the Sydney Morning Herald.

One of the submissions from a doctor who recently visited the Pacific island nation also reports an allegation of rape against a woman.

"She told me that since the rape, one guard had offered her extra shower time in return for sexual favours," Dr David Isaacs wrote in his submission.

Another submission from the Immigration Advice and Rights Centre said one boy began self-harming and talking about suicide. His mother believed he had been sexually assaulted, the submission said.

Australia and asylum

• Asylum seekers - mainly from Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Iraq and Iran - travel to Australia's Christmas Island by boat from Indonesia

• The number of boats rose sharply in 2012 and early 2013. Scores of people have died making the journey

• To stop the influx, the government has adopted tough measures intended as a deterrent

• Everyone who arrives is detained. Under a new policy, they are processed in Nauru and Papua New Guinea. Those found to be refugees will be resettled in PNG, Nauru or Cambodia

• Tony Abbot's government has also adopted a policy of tow-backs, or turning boats around

• Rights groups and the UN have voiced serious concerns about the policies and accuse Australia of shirking international obligations

Australia asylum: Why is it controversial?

On Tuesday, the first witnesses in the public hearing were from Transfield Services, the firm managing the facility on Nauru.

But many questions from senators on specific allegations and operations were taken "on notice" by managers - to be answered later.

Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young asked for information relating to the sexual assault of a young boy in 2013, according to ABC News.

"Very happy to take that question on notice... and provide you the detailed timeline and reporting chain of that particular incident or allegation," said Derek Osborne, Transfield's executive general manager of logistics and facilities management.

Labor's Alex Gallacher, who chairs the committee, asked whether male guards were allowed in the areas where women and children were showering.

"No - not as far as I'm aware," Mr Osborne said, adding that Transfield had subcontracted out security services to another company called Wilson Security.