The Australian Department of Immigration and Border Protection is refuting a hard-hitting reporting from the world's top two human rights watchdogs accusing the government of deliberately allowing horrible abuses to occur in the Nauru detention camp for asylum seekers.

The report from Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International says the government sits back while detainees are subjected to crime and violence from the locals, appalling housing conditions, and substandard medical care in order to discourage others from boarding boats in South Asia and trying to make it to these shores to claim asylum.  To reach this conclusion, the groups had to send undercover investigators to Nauru to talk with inmates because they said Canberra refused or ignored their requests.

"We strongly refute many of the allegations in the report," read the statement from the Department of Immigration and Border Protection, which placed responsibility for the conditions in the detention camp on the government of Nauru:  "The Republic of Nauru is a sovereign nation and Australia does not exert control over Nauru's functions, its law, its judicial system or law enforcement," the statement continued.  "Australia does, however, provide support to the Government of Nauru by funding accommodation and support services for all transferees and refugees, including welfare and health services."

The fact that Amnesty and HRW had to send its team to Nauru incognito was also blamed on the Island's officials:  "..access to the Centre is a matter for the Government of Nauru," and, "information about independent scrutiny organisations is available to transferees."

Amnesty researcher Anna Neistat doesn't buy that, and says the statement says nothing to address the core facts of the report:  That the refugees are suffering.

"What I found on Nauru is what I can only describe as a deliberate, systematic abuse," she told the ABC.  "We're not talking about individual cases, we're talking about patterns, and I think it is quite clear - and in fact I don't think the Australian Government tried very hard to hide it — that essentially they are making an example to prevent further arrivals by boat."