Imagine your daughter suddenly refuses to go to primary school. You ask her why, but she is evasive, scared.
Eventually she tells you the boys have been touching her without her consent. Feeling her bottom, hugging her.
She tells you she feels unsafe.
Imagine you are sitting in a car with your husband and young son. Another man, you don’t know, sits on the other side of your little boy.
He picks him up and puts him on his lap.
Afterwards, your son tells you the man put his hand inside his shorts.
Now, imagine there is nothing you can do to protect your children.
Your daughter must return to school and your son must continue to be supervised by paid security officers because your home is a white vinyl tent on an isolated island in the middle of the Pacific and there is absolutely no way out.
All children deserve a childhood. Source: Facebook
The above are just two examples adapted from more than 2000 leaked incident reports from the Nauru detention facility, published by The Guardian today.
Both occurred in 2015, but the reports span a period of more than two years. They detail shocking accounts of alleged sexual abuse, violence and self harm.
While the scope of the abuse alleged in the Nauru files is shocking, the over-representation of children is nothing short of horrific.
Only 18 per cent of those in detention on Nauru are children, but they are involved in more than half of the incidents outlined in these reports.