A major riot has broken out at a remote detention centre for asylum seekers in the Indian Ocean.
Australia's immigration department said there was a "major disturbance" at the detention centre on the country's territory of Christmas Island, with reports of damage but no injuries.
Refugee advocates said the riot broke out following the death of an asylum seeker who escaped from the centre on Saturday. The man's body was found the following day at the bottom of cliffs on the island. His death is being investigated.
The department denied there was a "large-scale" riot, but said staff had withdrawn from the compound for safety reasons.
The problem began when a small group of Iranian detainees staged a peaceful protest following the asylum seeker's death. Other detainees then began damaging the property, starting several small fires, according to the department.
The group leading the unrest appeared to be detainees being held there because their visas were cancelled, rather than asylum seekers, the department said.
New Zealand MP Kelvin Davis, who recently visited the island, said a New Zealander held there told him detainees had taken over the centre.
"They have put holes in the walls, so even if they are rounded up and put back in the cells they actually can't be locked up," Mr Davis said.
The immigration department said the perimeter was secure.
Immigration minister Peter Dutton said one detainee caught up in the fray had requested medical assistance for an unspecified reason, but no serious injuries had been reported.
New Zealand prime minister John Key said he was told there may be a few New Zealanders involved in the unrest and if so, they were doing nothing to help their case to stay in Australia.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here