Under Australia's tough border security laws, asylum seekers intercepted trying to reach the country by boat are sent for processing at detention camps on Papua New Guinea's Manus island and the tiny South Pacific island nation of Nauru.

Some 1,200 people are currently held in the camps, many of whom have been held for more than three years.

“I can now confirm that the Government has reached a further third country resettlement arrangement for refugees presently in the regional processing centres. The agreement is with the United States,” Turnbull told a press conference in Canberra.

The agreement, to be administered with the UN High Commission on Refugees, is available only to those currently in the processing centres and will not be repeated.

Turnbull would not say exactly how many refugees would be resettled in the United States, but said women, children and families would be prioritized.

Detainees who have had applications for refugee status rejected should return to their countries, he said.

Australia's offshore detention policy for 'boat people' has drawn widespread condemnation both at home and overseas amid reports of harsh conditions and systemic child abuse.

The deal relieves a major headache for Turnbull, whose poll numbers fell to a 14-month low last week, raising speculation of fresh political turbulence in a country that has had four leaders in six years.

Abdul Aziz, 24, who has spent more than three years on Manus Island after fleeing his home in Sudan in 2013, was very happy.

“All the refugees were smiling and hugging each other. This nightmare is going to end finally, but the main question is when and how and how we get out of here,” he told Reuters.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry told reporters while visiting New Zealand on Sunday: "We in the United States have agreed to consider referrals from UNHCR on refugees now residing in Nauru and in Papua New Guinea.”

The election of Donald Trump, who has threatened to ban Muslims from entering the United States and championed anti-immigration policies, has injected uncertainty into the deal.

But Turnbull said the "agreement was reached some time ago. There is a great deal of preparation and planning that has gone into it and, indeed, in leading up to this announcement."

No timeline was given for the process.

Amnesty International last month said as many of 410 men, women and children held on Nauru are being driven to the brink as a result of treatment that amounted to "torture".

Papua New Guinea has said it will close the Manus Island center, but the Nauru facility will remain open.

Asylum seekers who refuse offers to resettle in a third country or to return home will be offered a 20-year visa to stay on Nauru, but no financial support, Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said.

Once rich in phosphate, Nauru has limited economic resources and the Australian-funded detention center provides the tiny island state’s most significant revenue stream. </s> SYDNEY
• US immigration officials have postponed interviews with asylum seekers in an Australian camp on the Pacific island of Nauru since President Donald Trump's executive order on immigration.

This suggests Washington is already blocking progress on a controversial refugee resettlement deal.

Asylum seekers on Nauru who are applying to settle in the US under a refugee swop deal said that planned second-round interview dates with visiting US officials had been postponed indefinitely.

The deal had been agreed in the final months of Mr Barack Obama's presidency late last year. Under the deal, the US would take up to 1,250 asylum seekers. In return, Australia would take refugees from El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras.

More than a dozen asylum seekers on both Nauru and Manus Island in Papua New Guinea - the site of another Australian offshore camp - said they were afraid for their future since Mr Trump said that "extreme vetting" would be used, and after his testy phone call with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull.

Mr Imran Mohammad, 22, a stateless man from the Rohingya ethnic minority in Myanmar, said from Manus Island: "We don't know what to believe and the uncertainty is getting worse and worse. It is killing us inside every day."

There are around 1,200 refugees, mostly single men, being held at Australian processing camps on Manus Island and Nauru in conditions that have been harshly criticised by the United Nations and human rights agencies.

Australia, which maintains a strict policy of not allowing anyone who tries to reach the country by boat to settle here, has never detailed the nationalities of the detainees, but refugee advocates say most are from Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia and Sudan. </s> Sydney, Australia-Refugees held on remote Pacific camps after trying to reach Australia by boat will be resettled in the US in a "one-off" deal, the premier says, a breakthrough that could see the controversial facilities closed.

Canberra sends asylum-seekers who try to reach Australia by boat to detention facilities on Papua New Guinea's Manus Island and Nauru. They are blocked from resettling in Australia even if found to be refugees.

"The arrangements with the United States will offer the opportunity for refugees, both on Nauru and Manus, to be resettled," Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull told reporters in Canberra.

"It is a one-off agreement. It will not be repeated... Our priority is the resettlement of women, children and families."

Successive Australian governments have sought to stem waves of boat migration by people from war-torn Afghanistan, Sri Lanka and the Middle East, using harsh policies including turning back the vessels, and strict secrecy about operations on the high seas and at the remote camps.

Although the latest policies by the current conservative government largely stopped the arrivals, conditions in the camps have been widely criticised by refugee advocates and medical professionals.

They say some asylum-seekers suffer from mental health problems due to their prolonged, indefinite detention.

The UNHCR said the arrangement was a "much-needed, long-term solution" but warned that options should be found for everyone on Manus and Nauru.

"This announcement is full of holes. No timeframe. No numbers," added Daniel Webb from the Human Rights Law Centre, which has challenged offshore detention in court.

"This ugly chapter in our history only closes when every single man, woman and child suffering at our government's hand on Nauru and Manus is finally rebuilding their lives in safety. No one can be left behind."

The arrangement followed Turnbull's announcement in September that Australia would join a US-led programme to resettle Central American refugees at a Costa Rica centre.

Turnbull said officials from the US Department of Homeland Security would be arriving in Australia "in the next few days".

But he could not say how many refugees would be offered US resettlement and if the agreement would continue under the incoming Donald Trump administration.

President-elect Trump said on the campaign trail that he would tighten immigration, particularly for Muslims.

US Secretary of State John Kerry, who is in New Zealand, confirmed the deal, adding that "we in the United States have agreed to consider referrals from (UN refugee body) UNHCR on refugees now residing in Nauru and in Papua New Guinea".

Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said asylum-seekers whose refugee applications are rejected would be expected to return home.

Refugees who are offered the US move but reject it would be offered a 20-year Nauru visa, while any future boat arrivals will not be eligible for the deal.

Dutton stressed the deal was not an incentive for people-smugglers to send more asylum-seekers by boat, with Canberra set to ramp up its marine border patrols to turn back vessels. </s> CANBERRA, Australia — The United States has agreed to resettle an unspecified number of refugees languishing in Pacific island camps in a deal that is expected to inspire more asylum seekers to attempt to reach Australia by boat, officials said on Sunday.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull would not say whether he had discussed the deal with President-elect Donald Trump during their telephone conversation on Thursday. The Obama administration had agreed to resettle refugees among almost 1,300 asylum seekers held at Australia's expense on the island nations of Nauru and Papua New Guinea. Another 370 who came to Australia for medical treatment then refused to return to the islands would also be eligible.

"We deal with one administration at a time and there is only one president of the United States at a time," Turnbull told reporters, adding that the deal was reached "some time ago." Detailed planning had followed the agreement.

Trump has called for a moratorium or tight restrictions on Muslim immigration. Most of the asylum seekers are Muslims from the Middle East, Africa and Asia.

"We are going to work to protect vulnerable refugees around the world, and we'll share that responsibility with our friends in the regions that are most affected by this challenge," Kerry told reporters in New Zealand.

Few refugees have accepted offers to resettle in Papua New Guinea and Cambodia because most hope that Australia will eventually take them in.

Any refugee who refuses to go to the U.S. would be given a 20-year visa to stay on Nauru, a tiny impoverished atoll with a population of 10,000 people, Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said.

Turnbull would not say how many refugees the United States might take, but said the most vulnerable would be given priority.

"Our priority is the resettlement of woman, children and families," Turnbull said. "This will be an orderly process. It will take time. It will not be rushed."

He said the United States had only agreed to resettle refugees already on Nauru and Papua New Guinea. Refugees who arrive in the future would not be sent to the United States.

"We anticipate that people smugglers will seek to use this agreement as a marketing opportunity to tempt vulnerable people onto these perilous sea journeys," Turnbull said. "We have put in place the largest and most capable maritime surveillance and response fleet Australia has ever deployed."

Australian Border Force Commissioner Roman Quaedvlieg said ships had been positioned to turn boats back to Indonesia if asylum seekers attempt to reach Australia in the hope of being sent to the U.S.

No people smuggling operation has successfully delivered asylum seekers to Australia by boat since July 2014, but 29 boats have been turned back to Indonesia by the Australian navy. The government estimates 14,000 asylum seekers are waiting in Indonesia for an Australian policy shift that would allow boat arrivals to stay.

Turnbull announced at Obama's Leaders' Summit on Refugees in September that Australia would participate in the U.S.-led program to resettle Central American refugees from a camp in Costa Rica. Australia would also increase its refugee intake by 5,000 to 18,750 a year.

Turnbull said at the time that the agreement to resettle Hondurans and El Salvadoreans was "not linked to any other resettlement discussions" involving Australia's refugees getting to the U.S. </s> Alex Reilly is the deputy dean and director of the Public Law and Policy Research Unit at the University of Adelaide's Adelaide Law School. The views expressed in this commentary are his alone.

(CNN) The Australian government has announced a new deal , long-expected in policy circles, that will see asylum seekers on Nauru and Manus Island transferred to the United States.

This is the first positive news in three years for asylum seekers and refugees on Nauru and Manus Island. It is a circuit breaker that has received support from the country's Labor party.

However, it is worth observing that this could only be considered a good deal in a world where developed countries have a strong aversion to receiving asylum seeker claims at their borders.

In a rational world, Central Americans on the border of the US would be settled in the US and Afghans, Iraqis, Iranians and Sri Lankans placed on Nauru and Manus by the Australian government should be resettled in Australia.

However, by any measure, the refugees involved would see the US deal as far better than spending any more time in Australia's offshore detention centers.

The US offers these refugees the protection of a sophisticated constitutional and legal system. It's a gross exaggeration to suggest Donald Trump's America could be anywhere near as unsafe as the conditions that refugees flee.

Nonetheless, the transition to the US will not be easy, and is made considerably more difficult by the fact that some of these people have been detained under very stressful conditions for as much as three and a half years. Many spirits have been broken. These refugees will need considerable help in resettling successfully.

The whole point of offshore detention and processing was to send a strong message that it was not worth taking a boat bound for Australia. The government was happy to pursue, in a half-hearted and expensive way, resettlement options in Cambodia, Papua New Guinea and Nauru. These were not viewed as attractive resettlement options.

But the condition of asylum seekers and refugees on Nauru and Manus under Australia's care soon became an international embarrassment. With whistleblowers, journalists, doctors, civil society organisations in Australia, international NGOs and the government's own Human Rights Commission keeping the spotlight on conditions on Manus and Nauru, the government eventually had to find a durable solution for asylum seekers and refugees.

An encouragement for people smugglers? Not likely

From 2002 to 2004, the Howard government resettled refugees on Nauru in Australia, and this did not lead to a resumption of boat arrivals. The threat of offshore detention is an enormous disincentive. Furthermore, Immigration Minister Peter Dutton has been very clear the US arrangement is a one-off deal. Anyone who subsequently arrives on Nauru or Manus will face the uncertainty of if and when they will be resettled.

The announcement today that refugees must accept any resettlement option presented to them or face 20 years on Nauru or return to their country of origin where they fled persecution may be reasonable if a durable resettlement option is offered, such as is the case under the US deal.

The US deal is not contingent on legislation, now before parliament, for a lifetime ban on any people processed on Nauru and Manus since mid-2013 entering Australia. This is important as the ban is wrongly conceived, and has rightly been rejected by Labor.

It is already abundantly clear that asylum seekers arriving by boat will not be resettled in Australia. Whether they will be able to visit Australia in some other capacity later in their lives will not be high on an asylum seeker's list of concerns.

The effect of this bill is to punish for life an extremely vulnerable group of refugees, simply for the legitimate act of seeking protection and, in some cases, seeking reunification with family members.

Although it is possible for people in this position to apply to the minister to lift the ban, this may well turn out to be costly, time-consuming and complicated.

The government should be content to offer a good news story to the refugees on Nauru with its announcement of the US deal, rather than hitting them with a final punishment as they leave Australian government control to begin their new lives. </s> SYDNEY (Reuters) - U.S. immigration officials have postponed interviews with asylum seekers in an Australian camp on the Pacific island of Nauru since President Trump's executive order on immigration, suggesting Washington is already blocking progress on a controversial refugee resettlement deal.

The deal sparked a rare diplomatic spat between the two staunch allies, with Trump berating Australia's prime minister in an angry phone call that led to quick moves in Washington to reaffirm the strength of the relationship.

Asylum seekers on Nauru who are applying to settle in the United States under the refugee swap deal, agreed in the final months of Barack Obama's presidency late last year, told Reuters that planned second-round interview dates with visiting U.S. officials had been postponed indefinitely.

Under the deal, the United States would take up to 1,250 asylum seekers. In return, Australia would take refugees from El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras.

More than a dozen asylum seekers on both Nauru and Manus Island in Papua New Guinea, site of another Australian offshore detention camp, told Reuters they were afraid for their future since Trump said "extreme vetting" would be used and after his testy phone call with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull.

"We are deeply concerned about the U.S. deal," Imran Mohammad, 22, a stateless man from the Rohingya ethnic minority in Myanmar, told Reuters by telephone from Manus Island.

"We don't know what to believe and the uncertainty is getting worse and worse," he said. "It is killing us inside every day."

There are around 1,200 refugees, mostly single men, being held at Australian processing camps on Manus Island and Nauru in conditions that have been harshly criticized by the United Nations and human rights agencies.

The Australian government, which maintains a strict policy of not allowing anyone who tries to reach the country by boat to settle here, has never detailed the nationalities of the detainees but refugee advocates say most are from Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia and Sudan.

Trump's executive order last week suspended the U.S. refugee program for 120 days and stopped visits by travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen for 90 days.

Trump has begrudgingly said he planned to stand by the deal, but described it on Twitter as "dumb". Also on Thursday, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley called on Trump's administration to make the details of the deal public, noting it was made without Congressional approval.

An official source with knowledge of the process said confusion around exactly what "extreme vetting" would mean was the reason asylum seeker interviews by officials from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (CIS) were postponed.

"The CIS team stage has been postponed as they seek clarification on what information is needed under extreme vetting," the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity because she was not authorized to speak to the media, told Reuters.

"The feeling is that they didn’t want to conduct the interviews and then find out they needed to do the process again," she said.

The U.S. State Department did not respond immediately to requests for comment on the postponed interviews, which had been scheduled between Friday and Feb. 21, or whether the U.S. team would travel to Manus island as expected later this month.

The White House is yet to determine and make public what an extreme vetting process would entail, but detainees and their advocates are concerned it would effectively rule out all the eligible detainees.

It has proved almost impossible to determine what Trump means by extreme vetting.

Some refugee advocates fear it will entail medical background checks as well as strict security assessments. They say many of the internees suffer mental illnesses after spending years in the camps. Harsh conditions and reports of systemic child abuse in the camps have drawn wide criticism.

Negar, a 22-year-old from Iran who has been on Nauru for four years, said her first interview for U.S. resettlement on Jan. 24 lasted seven hours.

She was asked about her background, including where her family is now, the reason she fled from Iran, and who financed her trip to Christmas Island, a remote Australian island off the continent's northwest that is targeted by many asylum seekers who make the perilous sea journey from Indonesia after paying people smugglers there.

She was also asked whether she had links with any political groups in Iran.

Detainees said interview dates on their applications were removed on Saturday, hours after Trump signed his executive order.

They said they were given no formal explanation. Most of those who spoke to Reuters asked for their names to be withheld, fearing they could jeopardize their future by speaking publicly.

"We are back in limbo, and I am afraid if after four months they make up another thing to keep us here longer," said an Iranian woman with a small child.

"They just play with us, I wish we were dead in the ocean once instead of dying slowly, here in the exile," she said.

Behrouz Boochani, a Kurdish Iranian man who has been held on Manus Island for nearly four years, said there was some small consolation from Trump's "dumb deal" tweet.

"Since the day this deal was announced, we have been living with uncertainty over whether it will happen," he said. "Trump's twitter helps us in some ways as we know it will not happen." </s> CANBERRA, Australia — The United States has agreed to resettle an unspecified number of refugees languishing in Pacific island camps in a deal that is expected to inspire more asylum seekers to attempt to reach Australia by boat, officials said on Sunday.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull would not say whether he had discussed the deal with President-elect Donald Trump during their telephone conversation on Thursday. The Obama administration had agreed to resettle refugees among almost 1,300 asylum seekers held at Australia's expense on the island nations of Nauru and Papua New Guinea.

"We deal with one administration at a time and there is only one president of the United States at a time," Turnbull told reporters, adding that the deal was reached "some time ago."

Trump has called for a moratorium or tight restrictions on Muslim immigration. Most of the asylum seekers are Muslims from the Middle East, Africa and Asia.

Australia refuses to resettle any refugee who has arrived by boat since the date the tough policy was announced on July 19, 2013.

Australia pays Nauru and Papua New Guinea to house boat arrivals and has been searching for countries that will resettle them.

Few refugees have accepted offers to resettle in Papua New Guinea and Cambodia because most hope that Australia will eventually take them in.

Turnbull said the United States had only agreed to resettle refugees already on Nauru and Papua New Guinea. Refugees who arrive in the future would not be sent to the United States.

"We anticipate that people smugglers will seek to use this agreement as a marketing opportunity to tempt vulnerable people onto these perilous sea journeys," Turnbull said.

"We have put in place the largest and most capable maritime surveillance and response fleet Australia has ever deployed," he added.

Australian Border Force Commissioner Roman Quaedvlieg said ships had been positioned to turn boats back to Indonesia if asylum seekers attempt to reach Australia in the hope of being sent to the U.S.

No people smuggling operation has successfully delivered asylum seekers to Australia by boat since July 2014, but 29 boats have been turned back to Indonesia by the Australian navy.

Turnbull announced at Obama's Leaders' Summit on Refugees in September that Australia would participate in the U.S.-led program to resettle Central American refugees from a camp in Costa Rica. Australia would also increase its refugee intake by 5,000 to 18,750 a year.

Turnbull said at the time that the agreement to resettle Hondurans and El Salvadoreans was "not linked to any other resettlement discussions" involving Australia's refugees getting to the U.S. </s> The foreign affairs minister, Julie Bishop, has denied reports that the US has delayed interviews with detainees on Nauru, amid lingering uncertainty over whether America will honour a refugee settlement deal.

Detainees applying to settle in America under the deal had reportedly had their planned second-round interview dates with US officials postponed indefinitely, Reuters reported. But Bishop told reporters while on the election trail in Western Australia on Saturday that she understood interviewing and vetting was still taking place.

“The agreement is to be honoured by the Trump administration [so] I’m pleased this agreement will continue,” she told the ABC.

Confusion around exactly what the US president, Donald Trump, meant in saying the refugees would be subject to “extreme vetting” was the reason behind postponing the interviews, according to an unnamed source in the Reuters report. Trump described the refugee agreement as a “dumb deal” in a tweet.

Under the settlement deal, the US will take refugees currently held on Manus Island and Nauru in return for Australia accepting refugees from Central America.

The immigration minister, Peter Dutton, earlier said authorities were working to get refugees off Manus Island and Nauru as quickly as possible but it was a “difficult juggling act”.

“We are keen to get people off there as quickly as possible ... we’ve got unfinished business,” he told 2GB radio on Friday. “There’s a long way to go before we can get people off.”

Australian officials have been working with US counterparts to look at the individual cases of those held in immigration detention, Dutton said.

On Saturday hundreds of protesters rallied in Sydney against Trump’s immigration restrictions and Australia’s offshore detention of asylum seekers.

The crowd just shy of 1000 people marched from Hyde Park to the US embassy at Martin Place, according to organiser Ian Rintoul, as similar rallies were held in Canberra, Hobart and Newcastle.

Rintoul said they protested against Australia’s offshore detention of asylum seekers and its refugee-swap deal with the US, as well as Trump’s executive order blocking travellers from seven countries. The order was on Saturday subject to a temporary restraining order after a ruling from a US federal judge.

Rintoul said protesters wanted refugees in offshore detention at Nauru and Manus Island to be brought to Australia. He said that even if Australia’s refugee-swap agreement with the US did proceed, it wouldn’t provide for all the refugees at Nauru and Manus Island. </s> CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — The United States has agreed to resettle an unspecified number of refugees languishing in Pacific island camps in a deal that is expected to inspire more asylum seekers to attempt to reach Australia by boat, officials said on Sunday.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull would not say whether he had discussed the deal with President-elect Donald Trump during their telephone conversation on Thursday. The Obama administration had agreed to resettle refugees among almost 1,300 asylum seekers held at Australia’s expense on the island nations of Nauru and Papua New Guinea. Another 370 who came to Australia for medical treatment then refused to return to the islands would also be eligible.

“We deal with one administration at a time and there is only one president of the United States at a time,” Turnbull told reporters.

Trump has called for a moratorium or tight restrictions on Muslim immigration. Most of the asylum seekers are Muslims from the Middle East, Africa and Asia.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry confirmed that the United States had “agreed to consider referrals” from the United Nations refugee agency on Australia’s refugees.

“We are going to work to protect vulnerable refugees around the world, and we’ll share that responsibility with our friends in the regions that are most affected by this challenge,” Kerry told reporters in New Zealand.

Australia refuses to resettle any refugee who has arrived by boat since the date the tough policy was announced on July 19, 2013.

Australia pays Nauru and Papua New Guinea to house boat arrivals and has been searching for countries that will resettle them.

Few refugees have accepted offers to resettle in Papua New Guinea and Cambodia because most hope that Australia will eventually take them in.

Any refugee who refuses to go to the U.S. would be given a 20-year visa to stay on Nauru, a tiny impoverished atoll with a population of 10,000 people, Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said.

U.S. Department of Homeland Security officials are expected in Australia this week to begin assessing refugees.

Turnbull would not say how many refugees the United States might take, but said the most vulnerable would be given priority.

“Our priority is the resettlement of woman, children and families,” Turnbull said. “This will be an orderly process. It will take time. It will not be rushed.”

Refugees who arrive in the future would not be sent to the United States, he said.

“We anticipate that people smugglers will seek to use this agreement as a marketing opportunity to tempt vulnerable people onto these perilous sea journeys,” Turnbull said. “We have put in place the largest and most capable maritime surveillance and response fleet Australia has ever deployed.”

Australian Border Force Commissioner Roman Quaedvlieg said ships had been positioned to turn boats back to Indonesia if asylum seekers attempt to reach Australia in the hope of being sent to the U.S.

No people smuggling operation has successfully delivered asylum seekers to Australia by boat since July 2014.

Turnbull announced at Obama’s Leaders’ Summit on Refugees in September that Australia would participate in the U.S.-led program to resettle Central American refugees from a camp in Costa Rica. Australia would also increase its refugee intake by 5,000 to 18,750 a year.

Turnbull said at the time that the agreement to resettle Hondurans and El Salvadoreans was “not linked to any other resettlement discussions” involving Australia’s refugees getting to the U.S.

Refugee Action Coalition spokesman Ian Rintoul said some refugees on Nauru were “hopeful” of resettlement in the United States, but were frustrated by the lack of detail. There seemed no short-term hope for asylum seekers on Papua New Guinea’s Manus Island, a male-only camp holding 873 men.

“There are some people who if the United States is offered to them, certainly they will take it,” Rintoul said, adding that several would prefer Australia where they had family.

Rights groups have been scathing about conditions on the island immigration camps. Two asylum seekers set themselves on fire on Nauru this year and two local men have been convicted of murdering an Iranian asylum seeker during a 2004 riot at the Manus Island camp.

Associated Press writer Nick Perry in Wellington, New Zealand, contributed to this report.
Australia and the United States reach a deal to relocate asylum seekers from Nauru and Papua New Guinea's Manus Island to the U.S.