NAURU (Pacific Media Watch / Radio New Zealand International): A man who worked with the Salvation Army at the Australian government's deportation centre on Nauru has written a harrowing book about the living conditions there.
Mark Isaacs' book, The Undesirables, covers life on the island from October 2012 to June 2013.
Isaacs told Jamie Tahana of Radio New Zealand International that many asylum seekers tried to commit suicide once they realised their refugee status applications were being processed so slowly.
"Even a man lost his mind and had a out of psychosis and plenty of incidence of depression. So from a very early stage we could see it happening and it only got worse and worse throughout the time I was there. One particular man spent 40 days in his room without leaving and on his wall he had penned a tombstone which said: 'I died the day I arrived in Nauru'," Isaacs said.
There were very few counsellors on the island for the 400 men being detained there.
As on Manus Island in Papua New Guinea, where Australia's other deportation centre is based, it is very difficult for journalists to visit Nauru.
Pacific Media Watch reported earlier this year that journalists need to pay $8000 for a visa, which is not refundable if the visa is denied.
Video and story on the Sydney Morning Herald website
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 New Zealand Licence.
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