Dear Prime Minister,

Your Government once again flouts international and domestic law. The convention on the rights of the child, which Australia has committed to, depends on family unity. Our deliberate cruelty of forcing separation of families of refugees detained on Nauru is illegal. There are several cases of fathers stranded on Nauru while their wives and children are in Australia for medical treatment.

Even worse, a woman on Nauru who needs urgent heart surgery has been told that her teenage son must stay alone on Nauru while she is sent to Port Moresby. This is deliberate policy to force the woman to not leave Nauru. ABF, by refusing to let her son travel with her, is effectively denying her access to life-saving treatment. It is bad enough that the ill woman and her son have not been brought to Australia. It is appalling that she has been forced to choose between her son's safety and her own health and life.