The violent abuse of children in juvenile detention in the Northern Territory was the manifestation of a “culture ... of increased detention without trial” in the whole country, Australian Human Rights Commission president, Gillian Triggs has said. I think it’s just disgraceful.”Some of the boys assaulted in the Don Dale juvenile detention centre were Indigenous. Related: Northern Territory juvenile detention: calls for royal commission over shocking footageTriggs said a government-based independent commission was needed to establish the facts of the children’s abuse. Speaking on the ABC’s Q&A program after Four Corners aired shocking footage from a Darwin detention centre, Triggs endorsed calls for the matter to be independently investigated, with a view to charges being laid against those responsible. Triggs said she felt “absolute horror” watching the footage, which showed six boys in the Don Dale juvenile detention centre in Darwin being tear-gassed, hooded, restrained, denied access to water and held in solitary confinement for more than a fortnight.

Source: The Guardian July 25, 2016 21:33 UTC