Last four asylum-seeker children detained on Nauru will leave within days

The last asylum-seeker children on Nauru have been freed from detention and will be off the ­island in days, headed for the US with their families, the federal government has revealed.

The last asylum-seeker children on Nauru have been freed from detention and will be off the ­island in days.

The final four youngsters and their families were offered asylum by the US government late last week and are being processed ­immediately, the government has revealed.

After becoming Prime Minister in August, Scott Morrison has been under immense pressure to resettle all children held on the Pacific Island amid warnings their mental health was deteriorating.

Iranian refugee Sahar, 28, with her daughter Melanie, 3 (not their real names), on Nauru. Sahar has two children, both born on the tiny island, since being detained after arriving with her husband on Christmas Island in 2013. Picture: Lyndon Mechielsen

Since then, 105 kids have been moved from Nauru, with the final four scheduled to leave soon.

In 2016 the US agreed to resettle asylum seekers intercepted trying to reach Australia by boat and detained on Manus Island and Nauru, after Labor reopened the camps seven years ago.

Mr Morrison, who was previously immigration minister, said the government had “supported children compassionately without putting our strong border security at risk”.

“We have got the balance right. We have secured our borders, we stopped the boats and the tragic drownings at sea,” he said. “We have got all children Labor put in detention centres out, and we have shut down all the detention centres Labor opened.”

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But Mr Morrison denied the decision to remove all children from detention over the summer recess was to save the federal Government from a humiliating loss when parliament resumes on February 12. On the last sitting day of 2018, the government ­narrowly avoided a historic ­parliamentary defeat, which would have been the first of its kind since 1929, by filibustering debate in the Senate.

The manoeuvre bought the government more time ahead of the looming vote on a bill this month which will give doctors the authority to order the medical transfer of asylum seekers held in offshore detention.

The Sunday Telegraph poll on October 28, 2018.

In October, a Galaxy poll commissioned by The Sunday Telegraphrevealed voters backed the Coalition’s border protection policies but overwhelmingly wanted the federal Government to remove children from detention on Nauru. The poll also found the move could boost its election chances with one in four voters saying they’d be more ­likely to vote for the Coalition if a resettlement deal was reached.

Immigration Minister David Coleman, who visited Nauru a fortnight ago, said Australia had a generous refugee program, which is managed according to Australian law, not the dictates of people smugglers.

Almost 600 adult male asylum-seekers who ­attempted to come to Australia by boat remain on Manus Island, at least 130 of whom have been found not to be refugees.

World Vision Australia has been pushing to get asylum-seeker children off Nauru.